Friends of a murdered French film producer were duped into believing she was alive and well and had been on a date with a “mysterious stranger” when she was laying dead in a shallow grave in her garden, the Old Bailey heard today.
Laureline Garcia-Bertaux, 34, was found naked, bound and wrapped in bin bags under the soil of a flower bed at her Kew home, after it is said she was strangled by her ex-boyfriend Kirill Belorusov.
After Ms Garcia-Bertaux had been killed, Belorusov, 32, is accused of taking control of her mobile phone to deceive friends into thinking she was still alive, jurors heard.
Prosecutor Oliver Glasgow QC said Belorusov stayed at Ms Garcia-Bertaaux’s home after killing her, sending messages from her phone to himself as well as her friends Beth Penman and Iain Richards pretending she had gone shopping in Oxford Street.
In one to Mr Richards, he wrote: “Bought a few dresses and two pairs of shoes, and I can’t stop.
“And I met an interesting guy – maybe will go and have a coffee with him later on.”
That evening Ms Penman received a text supposedly from her friend, saying: “Sooo I met someone quite interesting – he’s a vet and we are going for coffee. I don’t know why I said yes but wish me luck”, adding: “He’s fit – shy and confident at the same time.”
Mr Glasgow told the court: “Clearly these messages were all a lie. Laureline’s phone had never left Richmond, let alone travelled to central London to go shopping and enjoy a date with a mysterious stranger.
“But why send such messages? They were clearly designed to deceive Ms Garcia-Bertaux’s friends into believing that she was alive and well, to persuade them that Belorusov was long gone, and to lead them to suspect this complete stranger might have been involved when it was known that she had gone missing.”
It is said Belorusov murdered Ms Garcia-Bertaux when she was asking for a large amount of money she had loaned him to be repaid.
On the day of the alleged killing, on March 3, he had gone to her home on the pretext of helping to find somewhere else to live, it is said, and also claimed that he was dying of cancer as he made excuses for not paying her the money back.
Phone records show that Belorusov used his own phone after the alleged murder to look up pornography and visit gambling sites, while still at Ms Garcia-Bertaux’s home.
He also sent a message to another woman he had been dating, calling himself “twisted” and telling her: “I’d kill for you and I’d lie for you.”
Belorusov, the son of an Estonia police officer, fled the UK shortly before Ms Garcia-Bertaux’s body was discovered in a missing persons search, jurors heard.
Belorusov denies murder, the trial continues.
