A BURNLEY woman who burst into a beauty salon and shot her love rival dead told a court she was mentally and physically abused by her prostitute mother.

Jurors in the trial at the Old Bailey were told Rena Salmon's mind was impaired when she shot 36-year-old Lorna Stewart after she endured months of torment by her cheating husband Paul.

The court heard the affair at the end of the Salmon's 18-year marriage triggered depression rooted in an unhappy childhood.

Salmon wept in the witness box as she described how she and her siblings suffered years of beatings at the hands of their mother.

"We used to get hit for anything. I remember she used to have all these men that would come to the house -- that went on every day.

"If a client was late we would get hit. I never knew my father but my mum once told me she got 10 bob for me -- that was her price at the time."

Dressed in a grey trouser-suit and white top, Salmon told the court she and her younger sister and brother are all of mixed race.

She went on: "Friday night was always bath night. My mother used to take her pick who went first.

"She used to scrub us with bleach because, in her words, nobody wanted us."

On day five of the trial, jurors were told they will hear from three doctors who agree that Salmon was suffering an 'abnormality of the mind' which affected her judgment at the time of the killing.

Opening the defence case, Patrick Curran said his client's 'appalling upbringing' made it 'virtually inevitable' she would suffer from clinical depression in later life.

The QC said: "The cumulative effect was to deepen that depression which worsened the illness she was already suffering."

The court heard that Salmon suffered chronic back pain in the mid-nineties which caused her to put on weight and led to a spell of clinical depression.

After learning of the affair she twice tried to commit suicide with overdoses of alcohol and painkillers.

Salmon shot Miss Stewart at her Equilibrium salon in Chiswick High Street, West London, last September, before calmly texting husband Paul, 42, to confess the killing, the court has heard.

She denies murder but accepts manslaughter on the grounds of diminished responsibility.

The Burnley-born defendant told how she met her husband while serving in Northern Ireland with the British Army.

By the early 90s they had both left the force to have two children and set up home firstly in Yeovil, Somerset and then in the Berkshire village of Great Shefford.

They met Lorna and Keith Rodrigues through their own children during school runs and became firm friends, Salmon told the court.

By the end of 2001 her husband Paul, a £85,000 IT consultant, had began an affair with the woman.

Salmon said she knew nothing about the relationship until January when she was told by Mr Rodrigues, who had intercepted a steamy email between the pair.

Salmon, of Crofts, Station Road, Great Shefford, Hungerford, Berks denies murder on September 10, 2002.

(Proceeding)