Family members sobbed as the prosecutor revealed gruesome details of the murders.

At one point a woman yelled out obscenities as the details were revealed.

Mr Smith said Griffiths had admitted to killing Ms Blamires in the flat and dismembering her by hand, while power tools had been used on the other victims.

"It was just a slaughterhouse in the bathtub," he told officers.

He told police he was studying for a PhD in homicide and he had "cut himself off from society" and a "civil war" was going on in his head. He claimed to have eaten raw parts of flesh of Ms Blamires.

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