A MAN accused of murdering his mother-in-law sobbed as he told a court how he cut up her body with tools from his Accrington takeaway.

Muhammed Arshad, 37, claimed that Zainad Begum, 56, hit her head and died when he pushed her away after she made sexual advances towards him.

Arshad, of Crumpsall, Manchester, denies murdering his mother-in-law at her home in Burnley Road, Accrington, in January this year.

His brother Mohammed Sharif Khan, also of Crumpsall, denies assisting him in the disposal of her body parts, which were never found.

Arshad told Preston Crown Court that he collected the tools from the Millennium takeaway in Church Street.

He wept as he was asked to describe how he then went about cutting up her body -- starting with her head.

Arshad said: "I put her head in a bag which I had taken into the bathroom. Next I cut off her arms and her legs and put all the pieces in the bag and tied them up. Then I cleaned up."

In police interviews Arshad had said that he had cut Mrs Begum's body up into "numerous pieces, numerous to the point that I could not count them."

But in court he claimed that the police had told him to say that.

Arshad also claimed the police told him to say he had used caustic soda to dissolve the body. In court he said he had only used the substance to unblock the plughole in the bathroom where he cut up the body. When asked why he was crying while giving evidence to the court Arshad said: "The day mum died, I cried back then and mum died again in the court."

(Proceeding)