A 57-year-old Perth woman is facing a life jail term after being found guilty of murdering her elderly mother and burying her body in a shallow hole in the back yard of their home, in a crime that prosecutors said was motivated by "palpable dislike and hatred".

Helen Levina was found guilty by a Supreme Court jury of inflicting fatal injuries to 76-year-old Ella Hromaya, whose decomposing body was found in bizarre circumstances in March last year.

The two women lived at the South Guildford house with Levina's daughter. After coming home early one afternoon, the daughter let the family's four dogs outside and later found one of them, a great dane, licking her grandmother's skull.

The daughter, who can not be identified, immediately called police who found Ms Hromaya's body partially buried behind two wheelie bins, with a crate and a dog bed on top.

It was alleged at her Supreme Court trial that Levina, who was her mother's official carer, had murdered her on February 22, before putting the body in the grave and pouring bleach over it to speed up decomposition.

Photos of the backyard where the remains were buried were tendered in court. ( Supplied: Supreme Court of WA )

Also found in the grave were a knife and a pair of scissors, while a second knife was found in one of the wheelie bins.

A post mortem examination found two injuries to Ms Hromaya's head and multiple stab wounds to her legs.

Relationship soured

Prosecutor David Davidson said the motivation for the crime was the "palpable dislike and hatred" Levina had for her mother, a "small, frail woman", who the court heard had lived with her and her family on and off for about 40 years.

The jury heard from a neighbour who testified that about six months before the murder, Levina had said to him:

"I have my mother living with me. I can't stand the f***ing b****. I want to kill her."

In his closing address to the jury, Mr Davidson highlighted Levina's two video recorded interviews with police in which he said she described her mother as "it", and said that during her 24 years of marriage she would "just show up like a bad smell".

Levina told detectives "there was always tension in the house" and readily admitted she wanted her mother to move out, saying "I just didn't want to see her".

In the interviews, Levina claimed the last time she saw her mother was when she left the house with two Jehovah's Witnesses who had visited her before.

She said the two came to the door and her mother, who was in her pyjamas, said to her "I'm ready".

Levina said she asked, "Ready for what?" and her mother replied, "They're taking me to the place I'm going to live".

Levina claimed she then saw her mother pack up everything, "including her winter pyjamas," and leave.

She said she had not heard from, or seen, her since.

There was evidence that Ms Hromaya had, through the Department of Housing, secured new accommodation and she had been due to collect the keys on February 23, but the court was told she did not show up.

CCTV evidence

A search of Levina on the day of her arrest found her mother's bank, concession and senior's cards hidden in her clothing, and the jury was shown CCTV footage of her withdrawing $780 from mother's account in the days after the murder.

A crime scene was set up outside the Nyinda Entrance home. ( ABC News: Garrett Mundy )

Levina denied any involvement in Ms Hromaya's death, and her lawyer, Henry Sklarz, argued while the relationship between the mother and daughter was "strained" it was "mostly amicable".

"It was a love-hate relationship. It was clear this was quite a dynamic family," he submitted.

"There was yelling and maybe swearing at times, but there was no physical abuse."

Mr Sklarz said Levina had a long-standing severe back injury, which raised questions about whether she would have been able to lift and bury her mother's body, and put a dog bed and crate on top of the grave.

The defence called a veterinarian to testify about the smelling capacity of dogs to raise doubts about the body being in the backyard for two weeks, suggesting that if it was there for that long it would have been found much sooner by the family's four dogs — a blue heeler, a shih tzu and two great danes.

Mr Sklarz also highlighted evidence from Levina's son about a telephone call he'd had with his mother around the time of the murder, when he says she told him his grandmother was moving out and he heard her in the background saying: "I'm leaving. Goodbye".

The jury deliberated for just three hours before finding Levina guilty.

After the verdict she glared at the jury members and muttered under her breath when the detectives who had investigated the case walked into the courtroom.

Justice Joe McGrath remanded her custody and ordered specialist reports be prepared on her, ahead of a sentencing hearing in March next year.