IPSWICH: A woman who was allegedly tortured by a 41-year-old man and a 15-year-old girl shortly before they allegedly murdered her was crying and pleading with them to stop hurting her, a court has heard.

An 18-year-old girl who visited Paul Clarke’s flat in Mountbatten Court, Ipswich in August last year described seeing Rosalyn Hunt in the front room with her face “black and blue” and blood coming out of her nose.

In a video recorded interview played to a jury at Ipswich Crown Court, the witness, who has learning difficulties, said she was told by the 15-year-old girl that Mrs Hunt had been at the flat for two days and she and Clarke were punishing her for kicking his dog.

The witness said that while she was at the flat she saw Clarke and the girl “torturing” 41-year-old Mrs Hunt by rubbing a cheese grater on her face until it bled, rubbing salt in her wounds, holding the blades of a moving fan in her face, whipping her with a dog chain and setting light to her hair with a lighter.

She described Mrs Hunt as “sitting there, crying and saying ‘stop’”.

She said that after the moving fan was held in Mrs Hunt’s face by the 15-year-old girl she saw blood on the fan. She also described seeing Clarke set light to Mrs Hunt’s hair on two occasions and seeing the 15-year-old girl picking up a dog lead and whipping Mrs Hunt across the face with a metal chain on the lead.

The witness also claimed that while she was at the flat Clarke and the girl had forced Mrs Hunt to get into a suitcase.

“She got into it. Her legs were hanging out and she was sitting in it,” she said.

Clarke, of Mountbatten Court, Ipswich, the 15-year-old girl, who cannot be named because of her age, and John Grimwood, 28, of Canham Street, Ipswich, have denied murdering Mrs Hunt, of Victoria Street, Ipswich, in August last year.

Clarke and the 15-year-old girl have also denied murdering 43-year-old Des Thorpe whose body was found in a flat in Limerick Close, Ipswich on August 10 last year.

It has been alleged that Mr Thorpe was killed because he threatened to tell police what had happened to Mrs Hunt.

The trial continues today.