A GRIEVING daughter came face-to- face for the first time with the man accused of brutally murdering her elderly mother.

Doddie Edmonds was giving evidence in the case against Matthew Hamlen, who allegedly tortured 77-year-old Georgina Edmonds before battering her to death with a marble rolling pin.

In the witness box at Winchester Crown Court, Doddie repeatedly stared at Hamlen as she was asked questions about her mother and the things she owned.

It was the first time Doddie had laid eyes on the 33-year-old, who, prosecutors claim, repeatedly stabbed Mrs Edmonds as a form of torture in a bid to extract her cashcard PIN.

Hamlen is then alleged to have rained one or multiple blows to the grandmother-of-two’s head.

She was found in the kitchen of her cottage in Brambridge on January 11, 2008, the court has heard.

During cross examination, Doddie said she believed two knives were missing from her mother’s kitchen in Fig Tree Cottage, Kiln Lane: a paring knife and a fruit knife with a serrated edge.

Jurors also heard witness Frances Pavey tell how she saw a man in a fluorescent jacket on the night of the murder — just like the man police were hunting after he tried to withdraw cash with Mrs Edmonds’ card.

Mrs Pavey said she saw the man hunched over and walking across the green in front of her home in St Lawrence Road.

She said she became suspicious as he put something in a dog waste bin from his pocket — but did not have a dog with him.

This week the court has heard details of the 36 injuries Mrs Edmonds sustained.

Pathologist Dr Hugh White said she sustained a minimum of five blows to the head and died of head injuries.

Dr White found a number of lacerations, fracturing of the skull and face, and knife wounds in her neck, chest, abdomen and upper back.

He said that the knife injuries had been inflicted when Mrs Edmonds was alive.

Hamlen, of Hamilton Road, Bishopstoke, denies murder.

The trial continues.