A woman accused of murdering her partner allegedly stabbed him at least six times as he ate pizza and left him with a knife “deeply embedded” in his back.

Alan Tomkins, a convicted child sex offender, was found dead by police in the hallway of his Strood flat.

He was discovered with a 17cm blade sticking out of his back almost three days after he’d allegedly been murdered by his drug addict girlfriend, Nina Mercer.

Mercer, who was a class A drugs user, is alleged to have plunged the knife into his back so hard that it was embedded 23cm into his body and remained there until the police found him in a pool of dried blood.

They forced entry to the home after some friends raised concerns for his welfare.

Mercer, who was also staying on-and-off at Mr Tomkins’ flat in Newark Court, Strood, but also living in a tent, is currently on trial at Maidstone Crown Court accused of his murder.

It is alleged the 43-year-old killed him after a row broke out at his home in Gun Lane on July 23 last year, after ordering a pizza from the nearby Papa Johns outlet on the corner of the road he lived in.

Mercer is accused of not only stabbing Mr Tomkins in the back, but doing so “repeatedly” and leaving a “significant open wound to the back of the neck”, before fleeing the property and calling her pal, Lee Robinson to help her “cover her tracks”.

The pair then allegedly returned to the flat where Robinson, 45, stole his wallet and cash card before buying groceries and getting cashback with it.

Opening the prosecution’s case yesterday (February 18), Hugh Davies KC told the court that when pizza delivery driver, Aamir Bajwa, handed over his order to Mr Tomkins at his front door, it was probably “the last time he was seen alive”.

He also said CCTV showed Mr Bajwa arriving outside Newark Court at 6.02pm that day and when the delivery was handed over, Mr Tomkins had no apparent injuries, and that Mr Bajwa didn’t see anyone else in the flat.

Mr Davies added: “There was, however, indisputably someone else present in the flat with him and that person was Ms Mercer.

“Mr Tomkins and Ms Mercer were in a difficult, at times, mutually violent relationship. He was a habitual drinker, and she was too, but additionally an abuser of class A drugs.

Most strikingly and graphically, the knife used to kill him was still embedded deep – that’s to say some 23cm – into his body

“She was effectually addicted to drugs and had a chaotic lifestyle, frequently making calls to the police, sometimes about Mr Tomkins allegedly assaulting her; but much of what she appears to have reported was done while she was intoxicated or under the influence of drugs, delusional or paranoid, or perhaps, designed to achieve a particular purpose with the police at a particular time.”

The jury also heard how, similarly, Mr Tomkins had also reported Mercer to the police on occasion, but never pressed any criminal charges.

The prosecutor added: “Their relationship had transactional characteristics – Mr Tomkins had a flat and money.

“Aside from selling things at street markets, he had recently had a substantial financial inheritance - and on her part, she offered female company, a degree of friendship, as there were reasons for many not to like him, which I will come to later, as well as, some form of sexual relationship.

“She says he was funding her acute drug addiction and he probably was.”

The court also heard the day after Mr Tomkins was killed, a friend, Tanith Brown, had arranged to meet him, but when he didn’t turn up inquiries were made with his workplace but he had not been seen there and later when there was no response from his front door, Ms Brown called the police.

Officers went to his flat on Friday, July 26, where entry was forced and Mr Tomkins was discovered dead.

Mr Davies added: “He was found by police lying in the hallway of his flat, clearly dead, with a large pool of dried blood around him on the wooden floor and this was just after midnight on July 26 at 00.24 hours.

“His legs were toward the doorway, he was in shorts and a T-shirt, as after all, it was July.

“There was blood spatters on the walls of the hall. He had some six stab wounds, and defensive wounds to his left hand suggesting he had tried to either grab or deflect the knife being used.

“Most strikingly and graphically, the knife used to kill him was still embedded deep – that’s to say some 23cm – into his body.

“The point of entry was to the back of the lower left chest, literally a stab in the back, the fatal injury, penetrating some 6cm beyond the 17cm length of the blade implying pressure when it was used and it also went through various organs into the heart.”

The court also heard Mr Tomkins suffered other stab wounds including one to the front of the lower right side of his chest as well as others which were “consistent with Mr Tomkins being under attack”, and there was also a gaping stab wound to the back of his neck and one to his right outer shoulder.

Mr Davies added: “Given the number, location and force used to inflict these wounds, some after all to the neck and back, there can be no credible suggestion that the person responsible was acting in self-defence.

“The prosecution alleges that the person who did this is Nina Mercer.”

The jury were also told that after leaving Mr Tomkins either already “dead or to bleed out”, Mercer then fled the property, called Robinson and the pair then returned to the flat, where Robinson, who knew Mr Tomkins, looted his wallet and cash card before making off in his vehicle.

It is alleged the pair then went to an associates’ homes nearby and discarded items including a distinctive “bloodied” Nirvana T-shirt which Mercer had been wearing.

The prosecutor also said Mercer was captured on CCTV and a neighbour’s Ring doorbell footage returning to the flat over the next couple of days on at least five occasions.

It is also alleged she sent a text message to Mr Tomkins’ phone after his death in a bid to further cover her tracks.

She was arrested when she again turned up at Newark Court during the early hours of July 26, as police were carrying out their investigations into his death inside his home.

Jurors were told during interview she didn’t answer any questions but provided a prepared statement in which she denied she was responsible for killing Mr Tomkins.

Mr Davies added: “This was a straightforward lie, because she now admits doing so, she is accused of murder, but what is her defence?

“She may claim not to be able to remember the circumstances of the killing. But she now accepts that she is responsible for his death.”

He also told the jury: “As the evidence develops (during the trial), the prosecution invite you to consider her deliberate and controlled contact in covering her tracks after the killing and what she did, and indeed conscripting the second defendant, Robinson, to help her dispose of not doubt bloodied clothing, the T-shirt, almost immediately afterwards.”

Robinson faces charges of assisting an offender by driving Mercer from the scene in Tomkins’ car and is also accused of helping her dispose of items relating to the alleged murder.

He was also charged with theft and fraud, relating to Mr Tomkins’s wallet, and also another count of theft of another man’s cash cards, which were stolen from another property around the same time.

Robinson recently admitted those charges but still denies the allegation of assisting an offender.

The prosecutor added: “He is accused of assisting an offender in helping her dispose of the blooded clothing, evidence that would have strongly incriminated her in Mr Tomkins’ murder. The T-shirt was never found.”

The court also heard part of the pizza Mr Tomkins had ordered was not finished and was found on a plate by an armchair in his front room along with half a bottle of wine, which suggested he was killed shortly after the delivery arrived.

At the time of Mr Tomkins’s death, Mercer had 43p in her account and was waiting for her monthly £700 benefit to be paid into her bank.

‘He was stabbed repeatedly – that’s not self-defence, and he was left to bleed out or was dead...’

Mr Davies added: “Only she can know in the end what caused her to do it, but the prosecution says whatever it was - and there may be no rational reason for the violence - it was no lawful justification.

“She murdered him and tried to cover it up. Robinson assisted her and shamelessly also used a dead man’s wallet for his own spending, and he knew Mr Tomkins himself.”

He also told the jury, however unattractive Mr Tomkins’ history was, being previously convicted of kidnap and sex offences against children, this did not begin to provide any justification for anyone killing him.

The jury were also told the first witness they would hear from would a pathologist who would explain Mr Tomkins’ injuries to them and then they would hear from detectives who investigated his death.

The prosecutor added: “He was stabbed repeatedly and that’s not self-defence and he was left to bleed out or was dead.

“A 17cm blade was embedded to the hilt into his back and then there were attempts to cover it up, both defendants lied in their respective interviews and having a knife in the back, we say that’s murder.”

The trial, which is being presided over by Judge Oliver Saxby KC, continues.