Roderick Deakin-White has confessed to killing Australian fiancee, Amy Parsons

He said he can remember hitting her on head in row but denies it was murder

Ex-Royal Opera House designer used cross dressing as a form of 'escapism'

Ms Parsons gave him an ultimatum to stop and then slept with an IT worker

She told Deakin-White she was leaving - and he beat her to death, jury is told

A cross-dresser told his murder trial today how he clubbed his fiancee to death as she showered after learning she was leaving him because she had a new man and hated his sexual fetish.

Roderick Deakin-White, 38, left Australian secretary Amy Parsons, 34, with ‘horrific' fatal injuries after battering her with a metal 'chin up' pole in their east London flat on April 25 this year.

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But as Ms Parson's sister and mother watched from the gallery, the ex-Royal Opera House graphic designer insisted her death was a 'traumatic' accident adding: 'I hate the sight of blood'.

The couple had been together eight years before Ms Parsons became unhappy and began sleeping with colleague James Saunders, Snaresbrook Crown Court heard.

She was planning to dump Deakin-White for her IT worker lover - and he left her ‘slumped and dying’ in the bath of their fifth-floor apartment in Whitechapel after a row when he learned their relationship was over.

Giving evidence today, he admitted he passed her a toothbrush when she showered and then grabbed the pole and hit her on the head, claiming she was 'being confrontational'.

He said: 'My buttons were pushed and I didn’t know what I was doing. It’s hard to remember that actual memory.

Roderick Deakin-White, 38, has confessed to killing his Australian fiancee, Amy Parsons, 35, (pictured together) by repeatedly hitting her with a metal 'chin up' bar - but says it was manslaughter not murder

Ms Parsons was pronounced dead at the apartment and a post-mortem examination revealed she had been struck several times leaving her with 'horrific' fatal injuries

Ms Parsons, who had started a new relationship with James Saunders, pictured outside court, was pronounced dead at the apartment and a post-mortem examination revealed she had been struck several times leaving her with 'horrific' fatal injuries

‘It’s obviously quite a traumatic thing to have to live with. I remember that action hitting her, I remember her slipping down in the bath, I don’t remember the blood, I don’t remember the sounds.

‘I remember hitting her when she was still up right I remember her slipping and then she was lying in the bath. And I hate the sight of blood.’

Deakin-White said her decision to leave him for Mr Saunders had left him feeling suicidal.

‘I was pacing between rooms, I had already passed her the toothbrush,’ he told Snaresbrook Crown Court.

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‘It was there in front of me. My head wasn’t thinking about what object to pickup, I was just doing it. She was being confrontational.

‘I felt angry towards her I don’t know if I wanted to hurt her.

‘You didn’t just shout at her?’ asked Gareth Patterson, QC, prosecuting, adding:'You could have said: “F*****g so and so I can’t believe the way you’re treating me,” couldn’t you?'

Deakin-White, who admits manslaughter but denies murder, claims he remembers very little of the attack.

He previously told jurors that he used cross dressing as an 'escapism', and would regularly wear women's underwear, stockings and make-up while at home

The exercise bar was kept by the front door as a precaution against anti-social behaviour and break-ins, jurors were told.

He said: ‘I think it was just from the fear of living where we lived. There was always an incident where the building could have blown up because people came and stole the gas pipes. It would have been a last resort. It was in case the worst happened with was a break-in in the flat.’

Deakin-White today told jurors that he used cross dressing as an 'escapism', and would regularly wear women's underwear, stockings and make-up while at home

Leaning towards Deakin-White the prosecutor added: ‘The prosecution case is that you intended to harm her, you intended to kill and you’re trying to minimise responsibility to minimise what you know is actually an offence of murder.’

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It is agreed by the prosecution and Deakin-White that Ms Parsons would have been in the bath, facing the shower head when she was hit to the back of the head.

‘She would have been unaware, yes, facing the other way,’ Deakin-White conceded.

‘You were just a foot away, tell us what happened,’ pressed Mr Patterson. ‘What happened to her head when the bar hit the back of her head?’

Deakin-White replied: ‘I’m sorry I’m not sure what you mean by that. I don’t remember the finer details, that isn’t to cover stuff up. Again I feel I would have held it in both hands.’

Mr Patterson described two blows to the back of the head that were delivered in similar places at the same angle, as well as bruises to the base of the neck.

Ms Parsons lost her tooth and split her jaw during the sustained attack while injuries to his girlfriend’s right wrist and shoulder could have been caused by her trying to protect herself, the court heard.

The court also heard of tensions between the couple regarding Deakin-White's long-term unemployment after failing to land design work

But Deakin-White said he couldn’t remember what she was screaming while the beating ‘sheared’ off the screw at the end of the exercise bar.

‘I didn’t stop until I thought she was dead. I left the bathroom, it was suddenly over, and I kind of regained my sense of where I was,’ Deakin-White said.

‘I don’t know when I regained full control, I was certainly in shock. I was certainly confused when I left I wasn’t sure it had happened.

‘I don’t think I was in control until I left the flat, it was reflex to turn off shower.

He told jurors he believed the ‘gurgling’ noises of blood in Ms Parsons’s throat must have been her last breaths.

‘I was totally in shock about what I just did, it’s quite a traumatic thing to have happened, to talk about and get your head around,’ he said.

‘I thought I had killed her, that I was a murderer, the only thing on my mind was to kill myself. It didn’t seem real and again for the life of me I do not remember the blood and that’s the truth.’

He accepted he turned the light off and put his coat over his bloody clothes before leaving.

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Neither of the couple’s phones were recovered by police search teams who conducted a ‘fingertip’ search of the river area Deakin-White claimed he threw them into.

Her phone had a red cover on the back which was not visible from the other side, he claimed.

CCTV played to the court showed Deakin-White looking at a phone as he left his building.

He denied the suggestion he was looking at her phone.

‘I must have taken it out of my pocket, what would be the point? There’s no logic in that,’ he asked.

Mr Patterson replied: ‘Her phone was full of evidence that to this day the police do not have. All those missed calls.’

Deakin-White initially avoided volunteering the codes to his or Ms Parson’s phone in the police interview following his arrest.

He had told police: ‘The reason I did it wasn’t just to hide stuff it was just because I was upset. It wasn’t to hide, it was just that we had sent messages to each other and I don’t really want people nosing through things that are unrelated.’

Deakin-White denies murder.

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The trial continues.