An angry Ruth Neave was rebuked by an Old Bailey judge for describing allegations raised in court that she may been her son’s murderer as ‘bull****”.

She retorted, to defence cross examination in the trial of James Watson accused of murdering her son Rikki: “At the end of the day, who's on trial - me or your client?"

Ms Neave used the ‘b’ words three times in a heated exchange with Jennifer Dempster QC.

Ms Neave was emotional as she was questioned about what she remembered of the day Rikki disappeared.

Ms Dempster said: "Is the bottom line you don't really know what time Rikki left that morning?"

The witness replied: "Yes I do. 8.30-8.45am.

"The police stitched me up and it seems like they are doing it again.”

Ms Dempster suggested at one point that Mis Neave had talked about the "perfect murder".

Ms Neave told jurors: "That's a load of rubbish."

She told the court that she had written a short story about a "perfect murder" in which a man kills a woman and "gets away with it".

But she insisted the dark tale was just a "fictitious story".

Ms Dempster asked: "Did you murder Rikki?"

Ms Neave said: "No because I never done it, I'm innocent."

Ms Dempster continued: "Did you murder your son? Are you really not going to answer that question?

"Did you kill Rikki without intending to? Did you kill him accidentally? Did you move his body in a buggy? Did you have anything to do with posing Rikki's body in a star shape?

"Did you take his body to one of his favourite places to play? Will you not answer these questions, Ms Neave?"

After a lengthy pause Ms Neave replied: "I treat it with the contempt it deserves."

Ms Neave, the mother of murdered schoolboy Rikki Neave, had earlier denied having an interest in black magic and bragging about being a "high priestess of the occult".

Ruth Neave was cleared of killing six-year-old Rikki, who was found strangled and posed naked in a star shape in woodland near his Peterborough home in 1994.

On Wednesday, Ms Neave was quizzed about her interest in murder and the occult.

Jennifer Dempster QC read a selection of titles of books that were among 143 items seized from Ms Neave's home in the wake of Rikki's death.

They included books about Moors murderers Ian Brady and Myra Hindley and unsolved killings.

Ms Neave told jurors that it was not illegal to be interested in the subject.

Ms Dempster went on to list books on the occult and sorcery such as Aleister Crowley's Magick In Theory And Practice, which was written in 1929.

She said: "That book was about rituals and sacrifices."

Ms Neave replied: "Yes, it was."

The lawyer suggested it also referred to "black magic", rituals of Pentagram and included diagrams of star shapes.

Ms Neave said she did not believe in the occult "now", adding that she had only been interested in Tarot and Quija boards and "stuff like that".

She denied having a conversation about how she could get away with the "perfect murder" when watching a television programme about forensic science.

Asked if she ever described herself as a "high priestess of the occult", she said: "No such thing."

Ms Neave also denied being into black magic involving "pins and dolls".

The witness laughed off an allegation that she told a police officer in January 1995 that she "had taken part in a seance to try to contact Rikki".

The prosecution alleges that police were focused on Ms Neave as a suspect when they should have been looking at 13-year-old Watson, who was seen with Rikki on the day he went missing.

She was asked why she did not accompany Rikki to school on the day of the murder.

“Ms Neave said: "I don't know why. It was the biggest mistake of my life not walking him to school."

Watson, now aged 40, was charged with murder after his DNA was allegedly found on Rikki's clothes found dumped in a wheelie bin.

He denies the charge.