LUKE MITCHELL knew where to find Jodi Jones's body because he had murdered her, appeal judges were told yesterday.

The account of how he led members of the schoolgirl's family to the scene was described as "a cornerstone" of the case against Mitchell during his trial, said advocate-depute John Beckett, QC.

Mr Beckett, who is trying to convince judges at the Court of Criminal Appeal in Edinburgh that there was enough evidence for a jury to find Mitchell guilty beyond reasonable doubt, also claimed the teenager later lied six times when questioned by police about the grim discovery.

During the trial in 2004 the search for Jodi, led by her grandmother Alice Walker, was played out in a special courtroom with a replica wall built by theatre prop specialists.

The court heard yesterday of Mitchell's repeated claims that he had walked past a V-shaped gap in the wall, then returned because his dog, Mia, had started sniffing the air and scratching, near to where Jodi lay on the other side of the wall.

But, Mr Beckett said, Mitchell's story was contradicted by Mrs Walker, Jodi's sister Janine, and Janine's fiance, Steven Kelly.

The advocate-depute recalled: "They say he went straight to the V without passing at all."

Mr Beckett added: "If the jury preferred the evidence of Alice Walker, Janine Jones and Steven Kelly on this point to what Mitchell said to the police then there is no innocent explanation for his being able to locate the body."

The court has heard it was dark, a large tree stump made it hard to walk down the inside of the wall and Jodi's body was out of sight behind a large tree.

Defence QC Donald Findlay has claimed during the appeal that Mitchell was looking in an obvious place and aiding the search. But Mr Beckett dismissed this alternative explanation that Mitchell was "the only one with the wit to shine his torch into the woods".

Mr Beckett told the appeal judges that Mitchell's story, photographs, what Alice Walker said and what a civilian police photographer said all made it impossible to see Jodi from the wall.

He added: "You could not see the body by standing on the wall and shining a torch up and down.

"If Mitchell knew the body was there, in the dark, in my submission it could reasonably be inferred that he is the murderer."

Mr Beckett said: "He found the body in very surprising circumstances in the absence of an innocent explanation."

He also suggested that Mitchell's lack of emotion when the body was discovered may have been because it was not so shocking for him - he had seen the injuries to her face and neck before, when he inflicted them.

Later the judges were told that Mitchell lied to police about his affair with a lookalike of Jodi. He did not want them to know he had spent three hours on the phone to Kimberley Thomson in Kenmore, Perthshire, immediately after an evening of sex with Jodi, said Mr Beckett.

He added that although it might only be speculation, Kimberley could have been the reason for a fight with Jodi. Mitchell's trial heard how he was planning a visit to Kenmore during the school summer holidays, just days after Jodi's death.

The trial also heard that neither girl seemed to know about the other.

Mr Beckett said: "If he was going to disappear to Kenmore to visit a girl Jodi didn't know anything about, the potential for conflict was there."

The judges heard that Mitchell told police investigating Jodi's murder that he had not spoken to Kimberley since January 2003, but telephone records showed 79 calls between then and the end of June. There was also a Valentines Day visit.

Mitchell, 19, is trying to overturn his conviction for the murder of his girlfriend Jodi in June 2003 when they were both 14-year-old pupils at St David's High School in Dalkeith, Midlothian. Her naked and mutilated body was found in woods beside Roan's Dyke path, Dalkeith, on the night of June 30, 2003.

The hearing before Scotland's top judge, Lord Hamilton - sitting with Lords Osborne and Kingarth - continues.