Lee Gillespie murder trial: Beaconsfield woman Jodie Willis told police 'it wasn't meant to happen like this' after arrest in Wycombe

High Wycombe man Lee Gillespie was knifed up to 15 times after tripping and falling while being chased by three people who confronted him while he was smoking in All Saints Church graveyard, prosecutors claim.

Jodie Willis, Martin Stanislaus and Leigh Burns stand accused of murdering the 26-year-old because of a relationship breakdown between Willis and the victim.

Yesterday, Reading Crown Court heard how Willis broke down when she was arrested on suspicion of murder the following day, asking is her former partner was dead.

Police officers said that she was speaking so openly they planned to use a body-camera to record her, but the battery was flat.

After being arrested the morning after the alleged murder, Police Constable Lee Andrews recalled her saying, "Is he dead? Please tell me he's not dead. This is awful. It wasn't meant to happen like this."

As she was led through High Wycombe Police Station she said: "Does that mean I'm going to prison? I'd doing anything to swap my life for his.

"This can't be right, this can't be happening. All I wanted was for him to stop harassing me."

Pc Andrews said: "She was incredibly distressed. It was like she knew she'd lost someone. There was a realisation that someone had gone. There was a lot of crying."

Later in the cells she said: "Don't look after me, I don't deserve it. I can't believe I've done this."

Willis later admitted she had cut herself with a razor on the night of the alleged attack.

The jury of eight women and four men yesterday afternoon heard how Willis had earlier calmly reported the assault over the telephone after voluntarily attending a local police station the morning after the horror attack.

In a recording played to Reading Crown Court, Willis said: "Hi, I need to report something that happened at High Wycombe High Street last night.

"I broke up with my boyfriend and my other ex-partner and father of my child came down and he was going to go and warn him about leaving me alone.

"I thought he'd just hit him so I just walked away, but someone's told me that he's dead."

She said she had broken up with Mr Gillespie just a few weeks previously and she had felt he had been hassling her when she walked through the town.

Willis admitted she had been present during the attack but thought Stanislaus had just given her ex-boyfriend a bloody nose.

At different points over the following hours, she told officers: "I've been going to rehab to try to get off drugs and make my life better.

"Something weird is happening to me - I just want Lee back.

"I keep thinking about all the s*** he [Mr Gillespie} used to do. He was horrible but I loved him."

It is the prosecution case that although Willis' ex-husband Stanislaus wielded the kitchen knife and delivered the fatal blows - which, the court heard, were "delivered with great force" - Willis and Burns were secondary parties as they helped organise the violence.

The trial was adjourned on Wednesday afternoon after Judge John Reddihough deemed Stanislaus too ill to continue. He was not present in court yesterday.

• Stanislaus, of Ealing, denies murder, perverting the course of justice and possessing a knife in public.
• Willis, of The Mead in Beaconsfield, and Burns, of Ealing, deny murder and perverting the course of justice.

The trial continues.