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Grace Millane murder trial: CCTV shows accused 'taking backpacker's body to woods'

The footage was shown at Auckland High Court in New Zealand, where a man is on trial accused of murdering the British backpacker.

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CCTV: Grace Millane's body taken to woods
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A jury has been shown CCTV of Grace Millane's body being taken to woodland where she was buried.

The footage was shown at Auckland High Court in New Zealand, where a 27-year-old man is on trial accused of murdering the British backpacker.

Ms Millane, from Wickford in Essex, died the night before her 22nd birthday during a Tinder date with the man at the beginning of December last year.

The pictures of Grace in the lift at the City Life Hotel were the last of her seen alive
Image: The pictures of Grace in the lift at the City Life Hotel were the last of her seen alive

Prosecutors say he strangled her before burying her naked body in a suitcase in the Waitakere Ranges, near Auckland.

The man, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, denies murdering her, claiming her death was an accident after she asked him to choke her during sex.

The jury was shown how cameras captured the man buying a suitcase and shovel and transporting her body in a rented red Toyota hatchback.

The powerfully built man was seen wheeling a luggage trolley into a lift at the CityLife hotel in central Auckland where he lived and going up to his £190-a-week room.

Police found Grace Millane buried in a suitcase in the Waitakere Ranges, near Auckland, New Zealand
Image: Forensic officers where the suitcase was found in the Waitakere Ranges, near Auckland

Shortly afterwards, he returned with the trolley laden with two suitcases, one of which he has since admitted contained university graduate Grace's naked body folded into a foetal position.

Grace's parents - David and Gill Millane - wept as the court was shown the CCTV footage.

The jury also watched footage of the suspect's first police interview.

For more than an hour, he gave an account packed with details of how he said he had spent the night of his Tinder date with Grace five days before.

The man accused of killing the British backpacker searched online for places to hide her body, a court hears.
Image: Grace Millane was from Wickford in Essex

With a photograph of the young university graduate, then being treated as a missing person, on the table in front of him, he told them he had said goodbye to Grace with "a hug and a kiss on the cheek", hoping to see her the next day to celebrate her 22nd birthday.

Then, he told Detective Sergeant Ewen Settle he had gone to meet a work colleague but ended up drinking himself into a stupor in a pub and waking up in his apartment the next day believing he had been carried in by the concierge.

He was a heavy drinker at weekends, he said, when he tended to "go crazy", and after sharing cocktails with Grace he had gone to a bar and drunk 10 glasses of Tui beer, paid for in cash, and treated 20 other people to drinks.

He said he woke up the next morning, had "a bit of a vomit", looked at his phone and saw it was 10am. He had tried to text Grace on Tinder the next day but she had unmatched him.

Later that morning he had gone for "a scotch fillet, medium rare, with mushrooms, chips and salad" for breakfast before having a nap and going to meet a friend from work.

The detective told him the search for Grace, whose parents had reported her missing the previous day, was ongoing. He asked the accused if he would provide a voluntary DNA sample.

"100 per cent," said the man. "I know I haven't done anything wrong so I'm happy to do it."

The suspect cannot be identified for legal reasons
Image: The suspect cannot be identified for legal reasons

The jury of seven women and five men watched, however, as instead of proceeding with the DNA sample, DS Settle told him minutes later: "We have reached a point where we have to advise you of your rights."

He showed the man a photograph of him entering the CityLife hotel, where he lived, at 8.15am on the Sunday with a suitcase he had bought that morning and told him: "You haven't told the truth. You've told a lie."

The man said: "I'm being truthfully honest with you, I've still got that bag in in my room.

"I might have got the times wrong but if you are assuming I was using that suitcase for something, I've still got it in my room and you guys can have it.

"It came from The Warehouse [a chain store]. I bought it that day because I was having to move all the stuff out of my room."

But the jury has heard he used the suitcase to take Grace's body in a hire car to remote, dense woodland where he buried it in a shallow grave early on Monday morning.

The Crown say he bought a second, identical suitcase which was left in his room at CityLife.

The trial continues.