An RCMP corporal told a Red Deer murder trial on Tuesday that the car Dana Turner was killed in "smelled like human death."

Cpl. Patrick Frey says the mother of three was sitting in a parked car with her on-again, off-again boyfriend Mark Lindsay. The couple was smoking drugs early on a Monday morning in August 2011.

According to an agreed statement of facts, Lindsay stabbed the 31-year-old in the eye with a pencil without warning.

He thought it would kill her. She screamed. He stabbed her in the other eye and wrapped a shoelace around her neck.

Then he drove to an abandoned construction site and ran over her body twice. Later that same day he disposed of the body in a forested area west of Innisfail.

Dana Turner was last seen August 2011 in Fort Saskatchewan. (Supplied)

Mark Lindsay admits he murdered Turner. But the son of the former Edmonton police chief, John Lindsay, has pleaded not guilty to charges of second-degree murder, offering an indignity to a dead body and obstruction of justice.

His lawyer, Kent Teskey, has told the judge Lindsay's mental state at the time of the offenses will be the sole issue to be decided during the scheduled two-week trial.

The defense will argue Lindsay is not criminally responsible due to a mental disorder. A psychiatrist for the defense is expected to testify Wednesday afternoon.

The Crown Prosecutor has stated they will argue Lindsay should be held criminally responsible for the crimes.

Outside court, the victim's mother said she thinks Lindsay is faking his mental disorder.

"I don't think for one-billionth of a second that he's crazy," Wendy Yurko said.

"I think he's extremely intelligent, and I think if he's let out ... all of us better lock our doors and move out of the country."

Lindsay has been previously diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia. Signs of his mental state emerged during a videotaped interview with RCMP in March 2012.

Cpl. James Morton had travelled to British Columbia to formally charge Lindsay with Turner's murder and to show Lindsay the evidence they had collected.

"You are responsible for killing Dana, getting rid of her body," Morton told him.

Wendy Yurko, the mother of murder victim Dana Turner, wants her daughter's killer Mark Lindsay to spend the rest of his life in jail. (CBC)

In return, Lindsay accused the officer of having a conflict of interest. He said he found out Morton knew the victim and was even intimately involved with her. The corporal denied the allegations.

Lindsay previously stated in sworn testimony he thought he was targeted by a group of serial killers. He calls them "healers." He was sure Turner was a healer.

He told Cpl. Morton he thought RCMP were healers too.

The increasingly agitated Lindsay asked Morton if he tortured Turner "to turn her into one of the killers." The corporal said he didn't.

"Are you one of the people who raped Dana?" he asked.

"No. I've never met Dana," Morton responded.

The videotaped interview is 5½ hours long. The remainder will be played in court Wednesday.

Yurko vows to sit through every moment of the trial, but says she's not expecting justice for her family.

"I want him to die the way he killed Dana," she said. "That would be justice."

Short of that, Yurko says she wants Lindsay to spend the rest of his life in jail.

"So that another young lady like my daughter doesn't have to perish for no reason. And some more little children don't have to live their lives without their mom."

janice.johnston@cbc.ca

@cbcjanjohnston