THE man accused of murdering a woman and her two-year-old daughter in Dundee has described being “apocalyptically angry” while committing the attack.
Andrew Innes admits killing Bennylyn Burke and her daughter Jellica but has denied that the act constituted murder.
While giving evidence at the High Court in Edinburgh, Innes said he carried out the attack after thinking “crazy things” about Burke.
He said she resembled his wife and a former women who had spurned him.
The attack occurred after Innes had driven Burke and her daughter from Bristol to his home in Dundee.
"The person standing in front of me looked like my wife and from the neck up (the other woman),” he said.
"I thought of all the nasty things my wife had done to me and I got angry, the way she treated me.
"I was furious, I started to think some crazy things. It's insane."
Innes told the court that it was not a premeditated attack and claimed that he had access to other more “appropriate” weapons than what he had used, including a samurai sword.
"There were so many items, if this was premediated in any way it would have been way cleaner," he said.
He added that his memory of the attack was fragmented and that he “kept hitting her until she stopped moving.”
Members of the victims family wept in the public seats while Innes gave evidence.
Earlier this week a junior prosecution counsel told the court that 52-year-old Innes had caused Burke’s death by stabbing her with a knife and repeatedly hitting her on the head with a hammer. Meanwhile, Jellica died of asphyxiation.
Burke, who was originally from the Phillipines, had met Innes online before being drive to his home in February 2021.
In March, the bodies of Burke and her daughter were found by police hidden under Innes’s floor.
The prosecution stated that he had put their bodies in rubble bags and concealed them in concrete beneath the kitchen.
He also faces charges of sexually assaulting Jellica and raping another child.
The trial continues.
