JILTED boyfriend Alan Pickersgill was so upset at his split with Julie Bywater he tracked her car and obsessed over her relationships with other men, a court heard.

Alan Pickersgill, 37, was ‘angry’ at the thought Julie Bywater might have feelings for old boyfriends or be seeing other men, Winchester Crown Court was told.

Jurors heard his head had been ‘messed up’ by the break-up and he had begun to covertly track the teaching assistant’s car.

Pickersgill denies the rape and murder of the bubbly 32-year-old teaching assistant at his Wayside Road flat in May last year.

The pair had met while studying for a massage diploma at Bournemouth and Poole College.

Course tutor Amy Bletcher told the jury it became apparent the relationship had ended after the couple returned from a holiday to Dubai in February.

“Alan sent me an email saying Julie had messed his head up,” she said.

“He seemed very upset he wasn’t with her and was too distressed to come into class.”

Pickersgill also told Thomas Wright, a close friend of his, the Dubai trip had not been a success.

Mr Wright told the jury: “Julie still seemed to have feelings for an ex-boyfriend and he was really disappointed.

“I think he was suspicious there might be other men on the scene and he was angry about this.”

He also recounted an odd incident where Pickersgill was fiddling manically with his mobile phone while driving, then suddenly pulled the car over.

Mr Wright told the court Pickersgill then predicted Julie would drive past, which she did, and they then drove off in the same direction as her.

Adrian Mudd, from Spy Equipment UK, earlier told the jury that Pickersgill had bought a car tracking device from his internet firm.

The court also heard from Marianna Maksimova, who lived in the flat below Pickersgill in Southbourne.

On the night of Ms Bywater’s death, she said she heard the teaching assistant talking in an ‘agitated and loud’ voice and heard her rush ‘very quickly’ into the bedroom.

Ms Bywater was found strangled with a plastic cable tie the following morning, the result, Pickersgill claims, of a sex game gone wrong. The case continues.