I looked into his eyes, they were soulless
MUM OF SCHOOLBOY FOUND DEAD IN WOODS TAKES TO WITNESS BOX
THE mother of a schoolboy found dead in remote woodland told a jury of the moment she looked into the ‘soulless’ eyes of the young man accused of murdering her son as he stood in her home days earlier.
Alex Rodda, 15, was beaten to death with a large metal wrench in Ashley, Cheshire, on December 12 last year, prosecutors have told jurors.
Matthew Mason, who was 18 at the time of the incident, denies murdering the teenager.
Mr Mason, now 19, killed Alex because he was being ‘blackmailed’, the prosecution claims.
He was paying his victim for sex, but didn’t want anyone to find out about their relationship, according to the Crown.
Payments of more than £2,000 were made to Alex by Mr Mason, jurors have previously heard.
Gordon Cole QC, defending, has told jurors they will have to consider whether the killing was self-defence or if there was a loss of control.
Yesterday, Alex’s mum Lisa Rodda took to the witness box at Chester Crown Court.
She told jurors she returned to her home in Pickmere, near Knutsford, on December 7 and saw the accused at the top of the stairs with her son.
Alex, Mrs Rodda said, told her Mr Mason was a friend.
She told the court: “When I looked into that boy’s eyes, I have never ever in my life felt fear... my whole body felt fear. His eyes were soulless. He was cold and soulless.
“I said to Alex ‘stay away from that man’.
“I felt it, what he was going to do to my boy, I felt it.”
Mrs Rodda broke down in tears during her evidence.
She later told the jury that on the evening of Alex’s death, she believed he was at a friend’s house. Mrs Rodda said she became concerned when he didn’t answer her calls.
She said she contacted his friends and eventually got in touch with Mr Mason, who she said told her he had driven Alex to the Heritage Centre in Holmes Chapel.
Mrs Rodda told jurors Mr Mason then told her Alex said he was going into Manchester shopping.
“I knew he was lying. I really knew something terrible had happened to my son.”
Mrs Rodda said Alex told her he was gay at 13.
“I told him that whatever he was it was alright to be himself, to be free,” she said.
Mr Mason, of Ash Farm in Ollerton, Knutsford, denies murder.