A JILTED boyfriend accused of murdering his partner after she dumped him was not suffering from depression or a personality disorder at the time of the killing, a leading psychiatrist has said.

Unemployed Jordan Taylor, is accused of stabbing Laura Davies, 21, more than 80 times outside the Essex Horse and Pony Protection Society in Pitsea, where she worked as a groom.

Dr David Baird, a consultant forensic psychiatrist, interviewed Taylor in November last year – four months after the attack.

Giving evidence about Taylor’'s frame of mind, he told Chelmsford Crown Court: “I asked Mr Taylor howhe had been experiencing his time in the four months in prison at that point.

“He replied ‘It’s all right I guess. At the beginning some people who knew about the case threatened me, but not now’.

“He told me he had formed some friendships with some of his peers on the wing and he also told me he was doing a full-time computer course from Monday to Friday, which is a Treasury-funded course.”

Taylor also admitted to Dr Baird that he sometimes suffered flashbacks from the attack, on Friday, July 3, 2015, and heard voices when he was alone at night.

Dr Baird added: “Mr Taylor said: ‘A few days before the incident, things got to the extreme. She was threatening towards me. I laughed at first, but the threat was she would smother me in my sleep. I didn’t think it was serious, but a few minutes later it started to have an effect on me. It planted paranoia in my mind and I was restless.’”

The psychiatrist said Taylor admitted being suspicious and anxious about partners cheating on him, but was not suffering from a recognised mental condition.

He told the court: “Having considered all the evidence, my opinion is Mr Taylor was not suffering from an abnormal mental functioning from a recognised mental condition.

“He does have some traits of an abnormal personality structure, for example he was suspicious and anxious at times about partners being faithful, however I didn’t feel that these together met diagnostic criteria.”

Taylor, 22, denies murder.

The trial continues.