Secateurs recovered from dead hotel worker’s car

Thursday 07 March 2019

Items allegedly connected with the death of a 37-year-old hotel worker have been passed around the Royal Court during the trial of the man accused of murdering her - including garden secateurs and black gloves.

Jamie Lee Warn (55) is alleged to have murdered his ‘secret lover’ Zsuzsanna Besenyei after her body washed up near L’Etacq last year.

The prosecution claim that Mr Warn killed the hotel worker before hiding her body in the boot of her car for three days in First Tower car park and then dumping her on a beach at low tide - he denies any part in Miss Besenyei’s death. 

Pictured: Jamie Lee Warn denies any part in Zsuzsanna Besenyei's death.

More details about the Hungarian national’s life and final days have already emerged as the jury heard from her ex-boyfriend who says he tried to rekindle their relationship the week before she was reported missing. 

Today, the Court has heard from Crime Scenes Investigator Graham Dryland who examined the defendant’s flat and Miss Besenyei’s car which was abandoned at St. Aubin’s Bay and identified a collection of items that were recovered as part of the investigation.

Amongst these were a pair of garden secateurs found next to the driver’s seat in Miss Besenyei’s Ford Fiesta car after the vehicle was revealed by the outgoing tide near to La Haule slip in St. Aubin in the days following her disappearance.

Mr Dryland told the Court that during the analysis of the abandoned vehicle, Miss Besenyei’s DNA was found on the steering wheel and “traces of the victim were also found on the secateurs.” The CSI added that “Mr Warn’s DNA was also found on the secateurs.”

Pictured: CSI Graham Dryland examined Miss Besenyei's car which was revealed by the outgoing tide near La Haule slip.

Answering questions from Crown Advocate Matthew Maletroit, co-counsel with Crown Advocate Simon Thomas for the prosecution, Mr Dryland explained that the fact the car was “heavily saturated in water” meant a “degradation of any trace evidence inside the vehicle,” but that the team “tried to obtain as much DNA as we could from it.”

Answering questions from Defence Advocate James Bell, Mr Dryland confirmed that during the investigation of Mr Warn's home address "nothing out of the ordinary" was found and "all of the areas that we sampled [for blood] proved negative."

When asked about a pair of black gloves found in the backpack, Mr Dryland said "they appeared to be clean" and when further pressed on whether he thought that the gloves had been used, the CSI explained: "It’s difficult to ascertain whether they had been used, but they looked like a brand new pair of gloves."

The Court also heard that the "areas of staining" on the carpet in the boot of the car also all came back negative when tested for blood.

Elsewhere on the trial’s fourth day, the jury heard the second half of DC Dennis McGee’s evidence, who completed a review of CCTV footage tracking the movements of a male in the area of First Tower car park, the nearby Checkers Express and town throughout the days surrounding Miss Besenyei’s disappearance in May of last year.

DC McGee told the Court that it was the same man captured on the CCTV footage who can be seen driving Miss Besenyei’s car, parking it in First Tower and buying items from the nearby Checkers Express.

Pictured: The trial into the 37-year-old's death and disappearance continues in the Royal Court.

In response to Crown Advocate Thomas’s question about whether he saw “anyone else approach that Fiesta” in the rest of the CCTV footage, DC McGee responded, “I did not, Sir”, adding that he “watched the footage completely and from every available angle." 

The Court also heard the evidence of an Officer at DVS whose examination of the vehicle led him to conclude that the engine wasn’t running when the car entered the water.

The fourth day of the trial came to a close with the testimony of a Cell Site Analyst and Mobile Network Surveyor who was tasked with surveying mobile data records for both Mr Warn’s and Miss Besenyei’s phones.

Pictured: The case is being heard in the Royal Court.

The Analyst told the Court that there were a few occasions over the period in question (10-14 May) where both phones were receiving signal from telephone masts which cover the same areas.

Of one such occasion, the Analyst said: “This supports the assertion that the phones were together, or they could be anywhere in the coverage area and separated.”

Answering questions from Crown Advocate Simon Thomas, the 'expert' witness also testified to the data records from Mr Warn’s phone in the early hours of Monday 14 May – the date when the prosecution claim he dumped the body of his ‘secret lover’ on the beach. 

The Court heard that between 01:01 and 01:21 on Monday morning, activity on Mr Warn’s phone was interacting with phone masts located in Guernsey which, according to the Analyst’s survey, provide coverage to Plemont, Grosnez, L’Etacq and Stinky Bay. 

During his survey of the phone mast coverage, the Mobile Network Surveyor found that there were two masts which Mr Warn’s phone interacted with on the morning in question that only provides coverage to the area of L’Etacq and Stinky Bay – the location where Miss Besenyei’s body washed ashore.

The trial continues.