THE man accused of murdering Jenny Nicholl was seen walking home by his mother-in-law after the alleged crime took place, a jury was told.

Evelyn Bagley told Teesside Crown Court yesterday that she saw son-in-law David Hodgson heading into Richmond on his own on July 1, 2005.

Mr Hodgson denies killing Richmond shopworker Jenny Nicholl on or around the previous night.

Mrs Bagley said she saw Mr Hodgson between 9am and 10am walking along Sleegill -a road leading into Richmond from the Holly Hill area.

She said: "He had his haversack on his back. I think he had both arms free.

"I think it would have his camping gear in. By the size of it, it could have been quite heavy."

The prosecution alleges that Jenny and the defendant would meet in wooden huts in Sandbeck Plantation, near Holly Hill.

The court has already been told how Jenny's car was found at the Holly Hill Inn four days after she went missing. Her body has never been found.

Mrs Bagley also told the court that she saw Mr Hodgson and Jenny in the same area several days earlier.

The court was told that she said hello to her son-in-law as she passed him walking over Green Bridge at the bottom of Sleegill.

She said Mr Hodgson was walking towards the town centre.

She reported seeing Jenny two or three minutes later walking in the same direction, next to the nearby Earls Orchard sports pavilion, and said Jenny was drinking from a beer can.

The court also heard evidence from Detective Constable Cheryl Price, who spoke to Mr Hodgson in the week after Jenny disappeared.

In his first interviews in the week after Jenny went missing, the defendant said he had played pool with the 19-year-old about six weeks earlier in the Buck Inn, in Richmond, the jury was told.

The court heard that he told police his wife and daughters accused him of having a relationship with the teenager several years previously.

He said the accusations had led to arguments at home.

He admitted his daughters once daubed the words "paedo" and "filth" on the walls of his house in Olav Road, Richmond.

He denied to Det Con Price that he had ever had an affair with the teenager.

The trial continues.