A man has been cleared of killing his cousin in an alleged sex game gone wrong.

Police found Mark Pickford curled up asleep in Dawn Warburton’s blood-stained bed beneath her hanging dead body, a court heard.

The mother-of-two was naked – with a rope tied around her neck several times and a number of injuries to her face and arms.

A jury was told how Mr Pickford, from Longsight, had exchanged a string of violent sexual texts with his 40-year-old cousin in the weeks before her death – one of which read: “You’re getting tied up, I will treat you like a random victim, gonna do you Manchester style.”

Prosecutors at his trial alleged Mr Pickford was guilty of assault and manslaughter by gross negligence because he breached his ‘duty of care’ towards Miss Warburton during a sex game.

The 41-year-old denied the charges, saying he had blacked out after drinking and taking drugs, and could not remember anything for five hours before police woke him up in bed.

He said he had only ever had ‘ordinary sex’ with his cousin and that he had sent the violent texts while drunk to ‘be a lad’.

The jury at Hull Crown Court found him not guilty after almost eight hours of deliberation.

Judge Jeremy Richardson QC said the case had been ‘unpleasant and disagreeable’ for all involved while thanking the jurors for the verdict.

The court was told how Miss Warburton and Mr Pickford had been out of touch for around a year before she sent him a text in March last year to say: “How’s tricks cuz?”

After exchanging a few more messages, talk turned to sex.

One exchange saw Miss Warburton write: “I scare myself the sort of dirty sex I’m into. It would warp your mind.”

Mr Pickford then began to travel 100 miles from Longsight to her home in the Avenues area of Hull every week for sex. He told the court that, during the final time in April, he believes Miss Warburton may have drugged him with diazepam which ‘knocked him out’ until police arrived.

He added he had not engaged in sexual games with her before she died.

Her body was found on April 13 by a neighbour, from the flat below, who went to investigate water dripping through her ceiling.

Mr Pickford could not be contacted for a comment.