Alesha ‘was abducted, shaken and raped before being killed on island’
Teenager, 16, denies murder of six-year-old on summer break
A TEENAGE boy is to stand trial accused of taking a little girl from her bed before raping and murdering her.
The 16-year-old – who cannot be named for legal reasons – is also accused of placing his hands over Alesha MacPhail’s nose, mouth and around her neck.
Prosecutors allege he was armed with a knife when he took the six-year-old from her bed at a flat in Rothesay, Isle of Bute, and abducted her in July this year.
It is claimed the boy then carried the schoolgirl to the site of the former Kyles Hydropathic Hotel on the island.
The indictment states he took off Alesha’s clothes and shook her violently before covering her nose and mouth with his hands and putting them around her neck.
The boy is said to have ‘applied pressure’ to her face and inflicted injuries by ‘means unknown’. Prosecutors allege that he went on to rape and murder the schoolgirl.
The teenager faces a separate charge of attempting to defeat the ends of justice by disposing of his clothes and taking a shower to remove blood from his body in a bid to ‘destroy or conceal evidence’.
It is also claimed he disposed of a knife on the shore at Rothesay.
Alesha’s mother, Georgina Lochrane, who is a witness in the case, was given special permission by judge Lady Rae to be present in court to see the proceedings at the High Court in Glasgow yesterday.
The accused’s QC, Brian McConnachie, said: ‘He pleads not guilty to both charges on the indictment.’
Both Mr McConnachie and prosecutor Iain McSporran, QC, told the court they were ready for a trial, which is expected to last ten days, to be set. Lady Rae then fixed a date of February 4 next year.
Alesha had been at the start of a threeweek break visiting family on Bute, in the Firth of Clyde, when she was reported missing at 6.30am on July 2. Her body was found a few hours later.
The schoolgirl had been staying with her paternal grandparents Calum MacPhail, 49, and 46-year-old Angela King, and her father Robert MacPhail, 25, at a flat near Rothesay.
Her death became a murder investigation after a post-mortem examination was carried out and the teenager was arrested two days later.
Alesha lived in Airdrie, Lanarkshire, with her 23-year-old mother, who is estranged from Mr MacPhail. She spent holidays and weekends with her father on Bute.
Devastated Miss Lochrane travelled to the island to visit the flat where her daughter was last seen.
Supported by her boyfriend George Horn, she stopped at a shrine of flowers and teddies outside the seafront property and broke down as she read the tributes.
At Alesha’s funeral in July, her uncle Calum MacPhail said: ‘She had a great amount of love for everyone. She was the brightest thing.’
The murder rocked the local community, which is home to 6,500 people. It is the biggest investigation ever undertaken by police on the island, which is 15 miles long and only three miles wide.
Earlier this year, an online fundraising page launched to raise money for Alesha’s family surpassed its target of £5,000 within two days. The page said the money would ‘assist this hurting family... to take just a small part of their burden away’.
‘She was the brightest thing’