JURORS in the Lee McKnight murder trial at Carlisle Crown Court have retired to consider their verdicts.

The Honourable Mr Justice Hilliard this afternoon instructed the 12 jury members to begin their deliberations just before 3.30pm after concluding his summing up of the evidence.

In recent days, the court has heard advocates deliver closing speeches for all six defendants.

All deny murder.

The prosecution says Coral Edgar, 26, lured Mr McKnight to her Charles Street home on the morning of July 24 last year.

While there, it is claimed, he was "beaten to the point of death". Prosecutor Tim Cray has told the court that drug dealer Jamie Davison, 26, was chasing Mr McKnight, 26, over a drugs debt.

Davison allegedly recruited two men - Arron Graham, 26, and 18-year-old Jamie Lee Roberts - as 'muscle' to enforce that debt.

Mr McKnight - badly injured but still alive after his beating - was then dumped in a river south of Carlisle.

Jamie Lee Roberts' father Paul Roberts, 51, and Coral Edgar's mother Carol Edgar, 47, are accused of helping.

Richard Pratt QC, for Jamie Davison, said the evidence showed it was Jamie Lee Roberts who had gone to Charles Street armed with a “knuckle-duster’ to attack Lee McKnight.

He accused the teenager of "going over the top" with his violence. Fiona Horlick QC, for Graham, said his defence case was simple. “He wasn’t at Charles Street at the material time,” she said.

“He had nothing to do with enforcing Jamie Davison’s drugs debt.

Richard Littler QC, for Jamie Lee Roberts, suggested it was Davison who was “drug-fuelled” and “out of control” on the morning Mr McKnight died.

Mr Littler said phone and Snapchat evidence suggested he had not been "the boss" during the Charles Street attack.

Caroline Goodwin, for Coral Edgar, said she never chose to get involved in the “bloodbath” at her home. “The difference between her and all the others,” said the QC “was that they made a choice to be there.

"She didn’t.”

Gordon Cole QC said Paul Roberts had nothing to do with ‘dumping’ Mr McKnight into the river and had actually tried to help him when he went to Charles Street to bring his son a change of clothes on the morning of July 24.

Carol Edgar’s QC Toby Hedworth QC said she was not at Charles Street when Mr McKnight was attacked, wasn’t in her Nissan he was taken away in it and did not consent to its use.

She had returned home to “carnage,” not knowing who had done what and there was no reason for her to want Lee McKnight, her main drug dealer, dead.

As he sent the jury away, the judge told them: "You only decide the case on the evidence you have seen and heard in court. Make no enquiries or research of your own."

The address for each defendant was given as follows: Davison, of Beverley Rise, Harraby; Graham, of Blackwell Road, Currock; Jamie Lee Roberts and his father Paul, of Grey Street, and Coral and Carol Edgar, of Charles Street, Carlisle.

The jury will resume their deliberations at 10am in the morning.