A TILLINGHAM teenager was bound, gagged and probably strangled before being buried in a garden, a court was told yesterday.

Dinah McNicol, aged 18 in 1991 when she went missing, disappeared in August of that year and was never seen or heard from again.

During the trial of Peter Tobin, 62, from Johnstone, Renfrewshire, who denies her murder, prosecutors said that evidence showed she was tied up using leggings and a headscarf.

William Clegg QC said: “The wrists had been tied together with her arms behind her back. A knotted gag was found in her mouth, presumably to keep her quiet while she was murdered.”

A postmortem revealed that the cause of death was consistent with ligature strangulation and gagging.

It appears that she was already dead when she was buried at a house in Irvine Drive, Margate.

A jury at Chelmsford Crown Court was told that Tobin matched the description of a man who was suspected of picking up Dinah and a friend, David Tremlett, on the way back from a music festival in Liphook, Hampshire.

Mr Tremlett left the vehicle at junction eight of the M25 and was the last person to see Dinah alive.

Mr Clegg also told the jury that after she went missing, cash withdrawals from Dinah’s bank account took place in Margate, Ramsgate, Brighton and Portsmouth - all areas where Tobin had a connection.

It was alleged that Mr Tobin had a propensity to abduct young girls, administer drug amitriptyline - a drug which causes drowsiness and dizziness - murder them and bury their bodies in rubbish bags.

Traces of the drug were found in Dinah’s body.

“It is clear that the defendant’s motives for these attacks is sexual,” Mr Clegg added.

There was no evidence of rape but when it was uncovered in November 2007, the body was severely decomposed.

Mr Clegg said: “There was clearly a sexual motive behind the abduction and murder of Dinah.”

The court was also told about Tobin’s conviction for the murder of Vicky Hamilton, a 15-year-old schoolgirl from Bathgate in Edinburgh, whose body was found in the same garden, where Tobin lived at the time, cut in half in two rubbish bags.

Samples taken from her body were also said to have revealed evidence of amitriptyline.

Mr Clegg continued: “Further excavation uncovered another human body wrapped in green and black rubbish sacks. This was the body of Dinah.”

It was alleged that a neighbour had seen Tobin digging a hole in the garden where Dinah’s body was found.

Tobin claimed that the hole was a sandpit for his son.

The jury was also told that in 1994 Tobin was convicted of rape and buggery on a 14-year-old girl and indecent assault on another.

He had given each of them amitriptyline to make them more compliant.