‘You Killed Lucy’ prosecutor accuses Dunford

She said: “To my total and utter horror I saw her face in the pillow and thought this could not possibly be happening to me again.”

She was referring to the earlier death of seven month old son Harley, who was found dead face down in his cot.

Lesley Dunford stands accused of murdering her daughter Lucy at her Camber home in 2004 by suffocating her.

The ongoing trial was taking place at Lewes Crown Court this week.

Prosecutor Sally Howes QC pointed out discrepancies between an interview Mrs Dunford gave to police in February 2004, days after her daughter’s death, and another interview a few months later in May.

In the first interview she told police that Lucy seemed fine and was her “normal chatty self” but in the second she said Lucy was “White as a sheet” and that she was worried about her.

Miss Howes said: “The reality is something very violent happened to that child.

“Something happened to Lucy and you know what it was don’t you?”

Dunford replied: “No I don’t. I have nothing to hide.”

Miss Howes said: “You killed her.”

Peter Gower QC, defending, asked Dunford: “Have you ever even struck your daughter in the past, or any of your children?”

She replied: “Never”.

The trial continues. Full report in next Friday’s Rye Observer.