A MAN accused of murdering a Cranage woman told a court he was watching the Olympics and weeding his front garden at the time prosecutors said she was killed.

David Ryan, 47, told Chester Crown Court on Wednesday, July 3, that on the day Diana Lee was found dead in her Cranage home he was at his own home in Byrom Street, Hale, watching the Olympics.

Earlier in the trial, prosecutors told the jury Diana was murdered between 6am and 7.51am on Thursday, August 9, 2012.

Ryan told Gordon Cole QC, defending, that he had been watching footage of female boxing, show jumping and Taekwondo from London 2012 and completing chores around the house after he had woken up on August 9.

The night before he had met Diana for the last time where he had had sex on the backseat of her Vauxhall Corsa while parked up in Portland Road.

He told the court that he had arranged to meet Diana the following Monday (August 13, 2012) and that she would pick him up at 10am in Cavendish Road.

“It was never a suggestion that I would drive to hers and she gave the impression that she was in the Altrincham area frequently and it made sense for me to be picked up and dropped off,” he added.

After leaving Diana at around 11pm on August 8, Ryan said he walked home to Byrom Street where he found his wife Karen – who was on annual leave – ‘dozing’ on the sofa.

He added that he then went to bed with Karen at around 12.30am but got up during the night to tend to his three dogs, before sleeping the rest of the night on the sofa.

“I looked after the dogs that morning and put the Olympics on after 7am and did some of the house work and put some washing on,” he said.

Neighbour Thomas Ball had seen Ryan cleaning the front of his house ‘thoroughly’ in the afternoon of August 9.

But Ryan said the purpose was to clean the cat mess and litter out of the front of his garden.

“Byrom Street is a walk through from Hale to Altrincham and you get people dropping litter and I was rinsing it off down the nearby drain so it was nice and clean,” he said.

“I wouldn’t say I was scrubbing ‘thoroughly’, I would say enthusiastically because that’s the way I do it.”

Ryan denies murder.

The trial continues.