A MOTHER wept in court as she recalled the moment her son confessed to a frenzied knife attack on a 14-year-old girl.

Jessica Knight was stabbed around 20 times in a park in Astley Village, Chorley, in January and was discovered bleeding by passers-by.

French national Kristofer Beddar, 21, of Daisy Hill Drive, Adlington, was living with British members of his family at the time of the incident.

The defendant’s mother, Marion Beddar, told Preston Crown Court that after watching a television news report about the stabbing the evening after the attack, her son called her to his bedroom and said he thought he had committed the crime.

”He said ‘Mum, I think it must have been me’,” Mrs Beddar said.

”I didn’t say anything at first, I sort of turned around in circles. I said ‘Are you sure?’.

”He said ‘Mum, I’m not sure at all but I’m sure I was in the park’.”

Mrs Beddar fought back tears as she continued: “By that time I panicked, and I said ‘We’ll have to go to the police’.

”I wasn’t thinking what he might have done. I thought, if he thinks he might have done it, it’s best to get to the police to get it sorted.”

Beddar told his mother that after waking that morning to find blood on his jacket and shoes, he had disposed of the items by a bridge over a local canal.

After her son’s confession, Mrs Beddar drove him to the bridge and was unable to retrieve his clothing, but did recover one of his training shoes in a nearby field.

Later that evening, she took Beddar to Chorley police station and turned him in to the police.

The court heard that when Mrs Beddar told her son they would have to go to the police, he replied ‘I want to go’ and said: ‘They’ll lock me up forever’.

Beddar, who the jury has been told admits causing her injuries denies a charge of attempted murder, claims to have no recollection of the attack after drinking a half bottle of Jack Daniels in the park that afternoon.

Jessica, now 15, had finished school for the day and was walking through the park listening to her iPod on her way to meet a friend.

She was stabbed around 20 times and sustained life-threatening wounds to her neck, abdominal area and chest.

When the teenager arrived at Chorley Hospital, her neck had swollen to twice its normal size.