Murder accused walked streets with bulky suitcase for two hours, court told
Jemma Mitchell is accused of killing Mee Kuen Chong at her Wembley home on June 11 last year before depositing her headless corpse 200 miles away.
A woman was captured on video dragging a bulky blue suitcase around the streets of London for two hours after allegedly murdering her friend and stuffing the body inside.
Jemma Mitchell, 38, is accused of killing 67-year-old Mee Kuen Chong at her Wembley home on June 11 last year before depositing her headless corpse more than 200 miles away in Salcombe, Devon, 15 days later.
On Thursday, jurors at the Old Bailey viewed CCTV clips tracking Ms Chong’s last known sighting.
Just before 6.30am on June 11, Mitchell was seen on video walking from her address in Brondesbury Park in Willesden with a large blue suitcase and backpack.
She arrived in Chaplin Road at 8.01am and emerged just over five hours later at 1.13pm carrying the blue suitcase and another smaller bag allegedly containing Ms Chong’s financial paperwork.
She was captured on CCTV dragging the bags on the street and through a grass verge for two hours before being picked up by a minicab.
In that time, jurors heard she had called various cab companies nine times before a driver collected her for the 40-minute journey home.
Later that evening, she went to St Thomas’s Hospital in central London to be treated for a broken finger, saying she shut it in a door – a claim the prosecution say is a lie.
The court heard the blue suitcase was not seen again until June 26 last year.
That day, it is alleged Mitchell hired a car and drove to Salcombe with the body in the suitcase stashed in the boot.
Jurors were shown more video footage of Mitchell stopping off near Bristol and later turning into a Co-op garage near Salcombe with a flat tyre.
Mitchell arrived back in London shortly before 7am on June 27 last year.
Later that day, Ms Chong’s decapitated body was discovered in woods by holidaymakers and her skull was found in nearby undergrowth a few days later.
Jurors have heard that Mitchell murdered Ms Chong because she wanted to get hundreds of thousands of pounds to pay for repairs to her home.
Mitchell has denied murder and the trial continues.
