A wheelchair-bound man was "bludgeoned to death" on Valentine's Day in his home and then his body burned, it has been alleged.

Friendly amputee Alan Wyatt, 68, lived alone at a ground-floor flat in Firethorn Close, The Vineries, Gillingham.

KMTV reports on the case

But a jury at Maidstone Crown Court heard how on February 14 last year he was "brutally murdered" by neighbour Michael Bryant, prosecutor Oliver Saxby QC told the jury.

Bryant, 35, also of Firethorn Close has denied murder and arson and the case is expected to last a month.

Mr Saxby told the court: "Mr Wyatt suffered catastrophic head injuries. His face had been stoved in - in other words, it had been bludgeoned with some sort of heavy implement.

"An attempt had been made to set his body alight. Mercifully, it seems that by that time he was dead."

The prosecutor added that people saw smoke coming from the flat and alerted the emergency services.

"Reports suggested that Bryant had been in the vicinity of Mr Wyatt's front door as the smoke first emerged but by the time the emergency services attended he had disappeared."

The seven woman-five man jury heard that police found Bryant in the early hours of February 15, sleeping in a doorway in Gillingham High Street.

Mr Saxby said that he was questioned eight times during the next few days and in six hours of interviews "swore blind he had nothing to do with Mr Wyatt's death."

He revealed how Bryant told police: "There's a prostitute called Laura, she wanted to get him killed." Adding: "Trust me, I was not there."

The prosecutor said that Bryant now accepts that he was present and had tried to stop the deadly attack.

He said: "Putting it bluntly, it is a last-ditch attempt by a guilty man to escape responsibility for the unspeakable crime he has committed."

When Bryant was arrested he had spots of Mr Wyatt's blood on his face, it was alleged.

Mr Saxby added: "They were spots of Alan Wyatt's blood [which had] been projected onto the defendant's face through the air – presumably as Alan Wyatt was being beaten to death and still there 14 hours later.

"So he now admits being present because he has to. But instead of admitting the truth, he is now saying that the attack was carried out by someone else who he had tried to stop but was scared of, and in effect, left to it."

Alan Watt was one of seven children who grew up in Chatham. He and his wife Paula separated after they moved to Brighton and he returned to Chatham around 2012. They had three children.

Mr Saxby said: "In 2014, he developed circulation problems in his left leg which resulted in it having to be amputated. He was given a prosthetic replacement but did not get on with it and so relied on a wheelchair.

"Some crimes defy logical analysis and this [case] may not be an example, in so far as motive matters, you may well end up forming the view that Alan Wyatt's vulnerability played a part in what the defendant did to him or at least the ferocity of what he did to him.

"Alan Wyatt was, the defendant probably thought as he was attacking him, someone who's life had little value."

When he was interviewed, Bryant is alleged to have called Mr Wyatt "the gentlest soul in the world."

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