A JURY has been told a double-killer's chilling diary entry could have been the start of him compiling a defence for his crime.

After stabbing to death a prostitute mental health patient George Leighers wrote: "Killed again - should have taken my medication."

Leighers, 48, of Montrose Street, Middlesbrough, denies murdering Sarah Jane Coughlan, 19, but admits man-slaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

But the jury at Teesside Crown Court yesterday heard friends describe him as "the usual George" in the days before and the hours after the killing.

After stabbing the teenager, Leighers went on to fulfil arranged appointments and travelled to Cornwall.

Franz Muller, QC, prosecuting, said Leighers' diary had been left on top of a fireguard, wedged open on the page of August 6, 2003 - the day he killed Sarah.

Within minutes of the stabbing, Leighers washed, changed and went to a newsagents shop to buy cigarettes.

He then made his fortnightly visit to his GP's surgery for anti-psychosis treatment and worked on a mental health stall in Middlesbrough town centre, as he did every two weeks.

That evening, Leighers met friends at a pub but left early, telling them he was going home to pack for a walking trip to Scotland next day.

Instead, he travelled to Penzance, where he gave a false name and address to a guesthouse owner.

After staying for a night, he took a coach to Inverness, where he handed himself into police, saying: "I want to report a murder."

Mr Muller told the jury: "One of the questions you have to ask is whether the note written in the diary and left on display with the marker for the police to see, was the beginning of a false explanation he was going to put forward for what he had done."

The court has already heard how he killed his 29-year-old wife, Rita, in 1986 and was put into a mental hospital's secure unit.

Following years of treatment and after being released into the community in 1997, it was ruled last March that Leighers no longer needed supervision.

But within months he killed Sarah after meeting her at a newsagents and inviting her back to his house.

Her body was not found until August 11 after Leighers handed himself in.

The trial continues.