19 Oct 2011

Tabak’s lawyer: my client’s conduct was ‘disgusting’

The barrister representing Vincent Tabak, who is accused of murdering Joanna Yeates, says his conduct was “frankly disgusting”.

William Clegg QC, whose client denies denies murder but admits manslaughter, told Bristol Crown Court that Mr Tabak’s decision to hide Ms Yeates’ body after killing her had caused ” untold anguish and agony to her family”.

Mr Clegg said he had not planned to kill the 25-year-old landscape architect, but “must pay the price” for her death. The court was told that after killing her, Mr Tabak, 33, surfed the web to find out the maximum sentences for manslaughter and watched a timelapse video of a body decomposing.

What he did was a dreadful crime. William Clegg QC

Mr Clegg said: “What he did was a dreadful crime, but it wasn’t something he had planned, wasn’t something he had intended and it wasn’t something he wanted to happen. Up until the moment that Joanna died, he never intended to kill her at all. He reacted to her screams, he panicked and literally in a few seconds he discovered to his horror that she had died.”

When the police knocked on the door of his Bristol home, Mr Tabak “couldn’t bring himself to tell the truth; he told lie after lie in those statements that he made”. Mr Clegg added that despite his “awful secret”, he tried to carry on as before “going to dinner parties, going to work, living with his girlfriend and living a lie”.

Vincent Tabak is on trial accused of murdering Joanna Yeates

‘Misread situation’

The jury heard that Mr Tabak, an engineer from Holland, had “completely misread the situation” when Ms Yeates invited him to her Clifton flat for a drink in December 2010. “He mis-read her friendliness towards him and made a move towards her as if he was about to kiss her on the lips,” said Mr Clegg.

“He put one hand behind her back, in the middle of her back, to pull her closer to him. She screamed. It was a loud piercing scream. He panicked. He put her hand over her mouth to stifle the screams.

“He said to her ‘Stop screaming’. He apologised and said he was sorry. He took his hand away and she carried on screaming. He panicked. He put one hand around her throat and the other over her mouth.

He never intended to kill her. William Clegg QC

“In seconds, far less than a minute, Joanna went limp. She was dead. He never intended to kill her. Nothing had been planned, nothing was premeditated.”

Ms Yeates’ boyfriend Greg Reardon was away at the time of her death in the run-up to Christmas 2010.

Listening in the public gallery in court Mr Reardon fought back tears as Mr Clegg described Ms Yeates as “bored and lonely” on the night of December 17th. Mr Clegg told the court: “if Joanna Yeates had stayed for one more drink at the Ram pub, she’d be alive today. If Vincent Tabak had left half an hour earlier to go to Asda, as was his intention, he wouldn’t be standing in the dock now.”