A PHARMACIST accused of murdering his wife viewed the ‘dark web’ for hitmen and guns in the months before she died, a court has heard.

Mitesh Patel was shown how to view parts of the internet that are usually not normally accessible by a colleague at the pharmacy, which he owned with his wife Jessica.

Mrs Patel died at their home in Middlesbrough in May after being strangled and suffocated.

A jury at Teesside Crown Court heard today how Mr Patel had been told about the dark web by Sam Hornby, 17, who worked at the pharmacy part time.

Mr Hornby said Mr Patel had appeared interested and he also believed he took notes about how he could access the sites at home.

The court heard the pair had found a page which brought up “things you wouldn’t normally find”, including guns, drugs, illegal movies and hitmen.

However, the only link they clicked on which brought up any results was a link for counterfeit money.

Mr Hornby said: “I just sort of did it, then we just looked through the links and scrolled through the page.

“I didn’t think it could lead to anything bad. It’s just something that I found interesting.

“When people watch documentaries about crime or murders, they just find it interesting.”

On a second occasion, Mr Hornby had again shown Mr Patel how to access the dark web, and the accused searched for insulin and suicide, but found no results.

The court also heard how Mr Patel’s use of dating apps had been “the worst kept secret in the pharmacy” and “everyone knew what he was up to apart from Jess”.

Ranjeet Khanda, who worked as a locum at the pharmacy, said Mr Patel’s behaviour was “weird” on the night Mrs Patel was killed.

He told the court: “His behaviour was a little bit weird, he was always quite weird anyway.

“Asian people meet, they always greet each other with a handshake.

“We used to do that every single time, but I found it peculiar that he didn’t shake my hand.”

He also noticed three scratch marks on Mr Patel’s neck when he returned to the pharmacy at around 7.40pm, 40 minutes after Mrs Patel had left.

“They were quite red – they looked relatively fresh,” he added.

Mr Patel then went to the store room, and Mr Khanda heard noises of ‘shifting’ movements.

A colleague then turned to Mr Khanda and said: “This is a bit weird. What’s he doing here? In all the time I’ve worked there it’s not somewhere he would visit.”

In cross examination, Toby Hedworth, defending Mr Patel, told Mr Khanda for the “vast majority of time” he would not normally be at the pharmacy when the accused was.

He also said Mr Patel did not shake his hand because he did not want to interrupt Mr Khanda, who was with a customer.

Mr Khanda said he “could not remember” if he was serving a customer.

Scott Sumners, who also worked at the pharmacy, told the court he had seen CCTV footage from inside the store of Mr Patel and another man “kissing and touching” and he was also on Grindr “every other day”.

“(He was) just chatting to other males. There were quite large conversations going on with people, not just a one-off message.”

Mr Patel denies murdering his wife.

The trial continues.