The man accused of killing schoolgirl Sarah Payne went into the witness box for the first time yesterday and denied "prowling" parks and a funfair in the hunt for children.

Roy Whiting told the jury he spent the day eight-year-old Sarah was snatched drifting from park to park in the Hove area of East Sussex before visiting a funfair in the evening.

Timothy Langdale, prosecuting, then asked: "Why were you at these places? The suggestion is that the man who abducted Sarah, and I suggest that was you, was someone out on the prowl looking for a child. Is that why you were at these locations?

"Why were you going to a funfair? You told us you did not like the rides. What were you doing at the funfair in this early part of the evening when there was more chance of there being a young child?

"Is it just coincidence that you happened to be somewhere where young children may be expected to be?"

He replied that it was.

Whiting, wearing blue jeans and a red sweatshirt, became more irritated as Mr Langdale continued his questioning - asking whe-ther it was coincidence that he was out in a van with a compartment in the back, and that there were plastic ties, a knife, a bottle of Johnson's baby oil and a semen stained shirt in the van.Whiting said it was "pure chance".

Mr Langdale said: "You are telling us that the knife was not there to threaten or frighten a child? There was baby oil in the van. Was it there for sexual purposes?

"There was semen on the checked shirt. Did that have anything to do with any sexual activity that had taken place in the van?"

Whiting claimed the knife was for cutting wire, the baby oil was for his dry hands and the body fluid had reached the shirt sleeve when he went to the toilet.

The 42-year-old former mechanic, formerly of St Augustine Road, Littlehampton, denies kidnapping and murdering Sarah, who disappeared on July 1 last year.

Her naked body was found dumped near Pulborough.

At the end of her questioning of Whiting, Sally O'Neill, defending, asked the accused why he had chosen to give evidence in the trial when there was no requirement to do so.

Whiting said: "I wanted the jury to hear what I have to say and to judge me on what I have to say. I have nothing to hide, I have told the truth."

Miss O'Neill said: "You are charged with the kidnap and murder of Sarah Payne. Have you, in any shape or form, been associated with that young girl?"

Whiting said: "No."

Miss O'Neill continued: "Or anything to do with her disappearance and subsequent death?"

Whiting replied: "None whatsoever."

Earlier, the court heard that Whiting had pressure-cleaned the interior of his van after ripping out the wooden panelling.

Whiting claimed he was 80 per cent sure that he had carried out the alterations on the morning of July 1, and had washed his van the next day.

He also insisted that he had been nowhere near the field close to the schoolgirl's grandparents' home in Kingston Gorse, West Sussex, where she had been playing with her brothers and sister before she vanished, or anywhere near the area close to Pulborough where she was found.

The case continues