A church warden accused of murdering a former lecturer and plotting to kill a retired headteacher drew up a list of 100 future “targets”, including his own parents and grandparents, a court has heard.

Benjamin Field, 28, told the jury the “100 clients” file was not just a list of future targets but of people who could help him.

Field is on trial alongside Martyn Smith, 32, for the murder of Peter Farquhar, 69, an author and former teacher, and conspiring to murder Ann Moore-Martin, 83, a retired headteacher.

Field admits deceiving Farquhar and Moore-Martin into believing he was in a relationship with them both. He also admits “gaslighting” the pair, who were neighbours in the village of Maids Moreton, Buckinghamshire, in order to benefit financially from their wills.

Farquhar died in October 2015 and Moore-Martin died in May 2017.

Giving evidence for a seventh day at Oxford crown court, Field took the jury through his “100 clients” list. He named his own parents, Ian and Beverley, paternal grandparents and two co-accused: Smith and Field’s younger brother Tom, aged 24.

He also named a former long-term girlfriend, members of her family, ex-partners, one-night stands, and other friends and acquaintances, such as a recently widowed female homeowner. “People who may be useful to me, either as targets of fraud or in other ways,” Field said.

He explained that his brother’s inclusion on the list was as a “prop” for his fraud of Moore-Martin. “He was used and manipulated by me,” Field said.

The court heard that Liz Zettl, a 101-year-old widow whom Field and Smith are accused of committing will fraud against, was also on the list. But Field insisted she had not been a target and was only named because she was Smith’s landlady.

“She was a useful person for keeping Martyn Smith in Buckingham and within my sphere of influence,” he said.

Other people named were linked to Stowe church, where Farquhar had worshipped, and who Field believed might be able to “support my studies of theology”. He said: “I thought they might be financially supportive of my phoney career in the ministry.”

Asked to explain the list, Field said: “I suppose I was setting out to make a very broad type of list and the title amused me.

“Some of them are targets. I didn’t see them all as targets. It is a title I have given to a very broad list.”

Field told the jury he had “manipulated and deceived” Smith, who he had befriended while studying at the University of Buckingham. “I was keeping secrets from him and lying to him and getting him to do errands for me,” Field said.

Field has admitted defrauding Moore-Martin of £4,000 to buy a car and £27,000 to buy a dialysis machine by claiming Tom Field was seriously ill.

Benjamin Field and Smith, a magician, deny charges of murder, conspiracy to murder and possession of an article for use in fraud.

Field, of Olney, Buckinghamshire, also denies an alternative charge of attempted murder. But he has admitted four charges of fraud and two of burglary.

In addition, Smith, of Penhalvean, Cornwall, denies two charges of fraud and one of burglary. Tom Field, also of Olney, denies a single charge of fraud.

The trial continues.