Former milkman accused of murdering Kent schoolgirl

"The defendant has over the years maintained his innocence of this murder, and he claimed, and continues to claim, that he has an alibi. We suggest that this is a false alibi not given innocently because he fears that he would not otherwise be believed but because he is guilty of this murder and he knows it. We will see that in both of the other attacks to which he pleaded guilty in 1996, he sought at first to divert the police with lies and provide false alibis."

"At the time of Claire's murder Ash-Smith was 24 years old and by that time he had already in December 1988 committed one serious offence against a local woman, some four years earlier, in which he had attempted to murder her by strangling her, and by stabbing her several times in the back, and he had attempted to rape her. She was lucky to survive. The killing of Claire Tiltman did not end his spree because two years later he attacked and stabbed another local woman 360 metres from where the prosecution say he attacked Claire "

"Claire was stabbed no less than nine times...a frenzied and remorseless attack by a ruthless predatory armed killer" -