THE young woman jointly accused of murder with five other people told police she had “covered her ears and shut her eyes” as Lee McKnight was being attacked in her home.

Coral Edgar, 26, made the claim has she gave her account of what happened in her Charles Street property in Carlisle on the morning Mr McKnight, 26, was severely beaten and dumped in a river.

His body was found on the morning of July 24 last year. The Carlisle Crown Court jury hearing the case heard summaries of accounts given by two defendants - Coral Edgar and 18-year-old Jamie Lee Roberts.

In her first interview, conducted the day after Lee McKnight was found, Coral Edgar told police officers: “I’ve got nothing to say... There’s nothing I can remember. I have severe mental health issues.”

She said she had been diagnosed with “every personality disorder” as well as anxiety and depression. She said she did not take drugs and had not touched alcohol for weeks.

In an interview the following day, the police officer asked her: “Is there anything you want to say. She replied: “Just that I’m not responsible for his death or moving his body. He did come to my property.

“He was attacked by Jamie in my house. That’s all I’m willing to say. I don’t know how he left the property. I just know I’m not responsible for the attack.” She said ‘Jamie’ was in the property and punched Lee at the front door.

“I just covered my ears and shut my eyes.” She said she asked Lee McKnight to visit her because she wanted “weed.”

After Lee was hit at the front door, she had “moved out of the way,” she said.

Lee had been taken into the kitchen, she said. Coral Edgar told the officers she had turned away, put her fingers in her ears, shut her eyes, and curled up in a ball on a seat in the living room.

She felt “scared and shocked,” she said, adding: “I didn’t expect it to happen.

Asked if she had tried to help Lee, she replied: “I don’t know. I’m scared of this.” The officer then asked: “Did Jamie murder Lee.” Coral Edgar replied: “I don’t know.”

The court also heard the account given by Jamie Lee Roberts, 18, though the two other men accused of meting out the violence to Mr McKnight - Jamie Davison, 26, and Arron Graham - also 26, had exercised their right to stay silent when quizzed by police. 

The teenager said that his role had been restricted to “burning” bloodstained clothing which Davison gave him. He did this so that his debt to Davison would be wiped out, he said.

That debt, he said, amounted to a “couple of hundred” pounds.

When he first spoke to police, the court heard, Roberts was asked what happened to the trainers he was wearing on the day that Lee McKnight was murdered.

The teenager said he had thrown them into the river at Armathwaite where he and Arron Graham had been camping.

He did this, he said, because he had kicked a burning log in the camp fire and the shoes were damaged.

Questioned further, Roberts told the officers: "I'm a 17-year-old boy. It's all playing on my mind... My head is [messed] up. I'm here in this situation.

"I've been here for three days and can't even brush my teeth properly. Of course, my head is going to be [messed] up."

In later exchanges, Roberts asked the officers: "How did he pass away? I don't know how he passed away."

Asked about a witness who claimed to have heard Arron Graham threaten to "chop off" a person's head and throw him in the river "like he did with Lee McKnight", Roberts said: "Absolute [rubbish]. Arron was upset and [very drunk]."

In one of his longest interviews, Roberts described getting a message from Davison early on July 24, saying: “Hello, mush. I need a bag of clothes.” He then woke his father Paul, 51 - also accused of the murder - and told him about the call, he said.

His father asked him: “Why does Jamie need clothes?”

Roberts junior said that he told his father it was nothing to do with them.

“He rang Jamie and talked to Jamie and I rang Jamie and said ‘I’m coming now,” he told the officers.

Before taking a bag of fresh clothes to Davison, said the teenager, Paul Roberts went downstairs and “turned off the CCTV” camera in the property where they lived, the teenager explaining to the police officers: “I thought you’d try to charge all of us.”

Jamie Lee Roberts then described arriving at the house in Charles Street where the prosecution say Lee McKnight was attacked.

When he arrived at the house, Coral Edgar, 26 - also charged with murder along with her mother Carol, 47 - was “in hysterics,” he said.

The teenager said Davison - who he said came to the door wearing boxer shorts - gave him a bag containing clothes.

“Do you know what clothes were in there?” asked the police officer. Roberts replied: “Just minging clothes, which had blood on them.” The teenager said he did not go into the Charles Street house.

He then took the bag to “Botch field” and tried to burn it and the clothes under a bridge. His first attempt failed, he said.

After he returned home, Roberts senior gave him a can of deodorant and he had returned to the bag and used the can to set the bag on “fire properly”, he said.

Explaining why he said he agreed to deal with the clothes for Davison, the teenager said: “Because I owed Jamie Davison money. “I’ve had to do it because I owe him money and I can’t pay.”

When the officer suggested Roberts junior was more involved and agreed to help Davison to clear his debt, the teenager said: “You’re just thinking fantasies... I’m a 17-year-old boy.

"Why would anyone want my help.”

Referring to a telephone call in which a witness said Roberts junior had spoken of ‘getting away with it” while his dad was being sent down for murder, the teenager denied saying that.

He said Lee McKnight died from drowning, not being beaten up.

Mr McKnight’s murder is denied by all six defendants: Jamie Davison, 26, of Beverley Rise, Harraby; Arron Graham, 26, of Blackwell Road, Currock; Jamie Lee Roberts, of Grey Street, Carlisle; Coral Edgar, of Charles Street; Carol Edgar, 47, also of Charles Street; and Jamie Lee Roberts’ father Paul Roberts, 51, also of Grey Street.

The trial continues.