A GRANDSON who is on trial for killing his grandmother at her home in Helston has told a jury that he was too scared to raise the alarm after witnessing another man carry out the knife attack.

Cameron Dancey-Stevenson, who was living rough in a park in Helston at the time but is now a patient at the Langdon Hospital in Dawlish, denied inventing the fictitious intruder to explain his own actions and said he had not killed 62-year-old retired care home owner Alison Stevenson.

He said he went into her home in the early hours of May 25, 2021 after hearing her arguing with a stranger and was then confronted by a man who he did not know and who made him demand money from his grandmother.

Dancey-Stevenson told Exeter Crown Court that he picked up a kitchen knife on the way up the stairs of her home in Greenbank but was then disarmed by the intruder.

Under cross-examination, he said he heard the killing as he waited inside a room next to Mrs Stevenson’s bedroom but did not see the attack or the killer leave.

He said he was then too scared to call for help but covered her body with his coat, getting it covered in blood in the process.

Dancey-Stevenson, aged 27, denies murder.

The prosecution allege he killed his grandmother because she had stopped giving him money, banned him from her house, and called the police when he broke a court order to stay away from it.

Dancey-Stevenson was due to be sentenced by Truro Magistrates Court for breaching a restraining order later on the morning of the killing.

Forensic evidence, including minute by minute readings from Mrs Stevenson’s smart electric meter, have shown he washed his clothes at her house between 2.30 am and 5.30 am before leaving, with her lying dead in her bed upstairs.

Mr Tahir Khan, KC, prosecuting, cross examined Dancey-Stevenson about his account of seeing another man in the house.

He was asked: 'You were alone in your grandmother’s house and I suggest you have invented a fictitious assailant to blame someone else for killing her?'

He replied: 'That’s wrong.'

Dancey-Stevenson accepted he was wearing a balaclava that night but said he had rolled it up and was using as a hat rather than a mask. He denied going into the house to ask for money.

Mr Khan asked why he had not sought help when he realised there was an intruder in the house, instead of going inside. Dancey-Stevenson replied: 'It was very early in the morning. I thought I would handle it myself.'

He said he had not run away from the intruder after the man took the knife from him because he was too scared and thought he would fall down the stairs. He said: 'I thought I would be next.'

Asked why he did not call for help after finding his grandmother dead and with serious knife injuries to her throat, he said: 'I went into Alison’s room and saw she was injured or dead. It did not look like she was still breathing. There was zero movement.

'I did not get any help because I had no change for a phone box and I was unwilling to knock on anyone’s door at that time of night. I was too scared to go any further with it. I didn’t want anything to do with it, I did not want to get into trouble.

'I was too scared. I could not find her phone and thought it was best to leave it and sort it out later.'

Judge Simon Carr has told the jury that he will deliver written directions about the law and they will then hear closing speeches tomorrow. He said he will sum up the case when the jury return after the long bank holiday weekend.

The trial continues.