Man accused of murder admits he buried body

The man accused of murdering British backpacker Grace Millane told police he disposed of her body after he woke up to find her dead in his room.

The Crown claims Millane, 21, was strangled by the man she met on dating website Tinder in December 2018. The defence claims her death was an accident during consensual sex.

The accused, 27, who has name suppression, has pleaded not guilty to murder, at his High Court trial in Auckland.

Yesterday, the accused’s second police interview, recorded on December 8, was played to the jury. In it he tells officers a very different version to his earlier account of the night he spent with Millane. He talks about their time at several bars and how they drank a lot of cocktails, before going back to his room at the CityLife hotel.

Once in the apartment, the accused said Millane started talking about the sexual fantasy film 50 Shades of Grey.

He said at first the pair engaged in ‘‘normal’’ sex before Millane allegedly asked him if they could ‘‘get into bondage’’.

The defendant said Millane bit him and showed police a yellow bruise on his shoulder, and admitted he bit Millane on her shoulder. ‘‘I stopped at first and said: is this something you really want to do?’’

He said she replied saying ‘‘we are in the moment, let’s just go with it’’.

‘‘I’m new to all of that stuff ... at first I was uncomfortable but I liked her and I was open to the idea,’’ the accused told police.

He said the sex became more violent and the pair took intimate photos of each other.

‘‘She told me to hold her arms tighter and then she told me to hold her throat ...’’

Afterwards, the accused said he went into the shower where he fell asleep. He woke up and crawled into bed, believing Millane had left.

The accused told police he woke the next day to find Millane lying on her back, with blood coming from her nose.

‘‘I screamed and yelled out at her. Tried to move her to see if she was awake.’’

He panicked and dialled 111 but did not make the call because he thought the situation ‘‘looked bad’’.

He told police he only saw a small amount of blood coming from Millane’s nose but he ‘‘smudged’’ it while he was cleaning, making it worse.

The accused said he was ‘‘terrified and scared’’ so he went to the Warehouse store and bought a suitcase before returning, not knowing what to do with it.

He then tried to take his own life.

He said he tried to put Millane’s body in the suitcase but he couldn’t as he was in shock and ‘‘it didn’t seem right’’.

He went out to buy cleaning products and when he returned, he thought ‘‘she’s going to wake up, she’s going to be OK’’, before he messaged a friend.

That ‘‘friend’’ was the young woman he went on a date with later that day.

Later in the interview, the accused got emotional as he described how he put Millane’s body in the suitcase.

‘‘The whole time I kept saying: I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’’ he said.

The accused admitted to police that he disposed of Millane’s personal items in a rubbish bin at Auckland’s Albert Park, and admitted burying her body.

He was asked if he was happy to show police where Millane was buried and he agreed.

Finally, the accused was asked: ‘‘Did you kill Grace Millane?’’ to which he replied ‘‘no’’. He also denied intending to cause her death or cause her injury before he was arrested.