THE horrific aftermath of the beheading of a British woman in Tenerife has been described by an Oxford man.

Former Oxford Mail writer Colin Kirby witnessed the suspect running through the streets with the victim’s head.

Grandmother Jennifer Mills-Westley, 60, from Norfolk, was stabbed in the neck 14 times and beheaded in Los Cristianos on Friday.

A Bulgarian man Deyan Deyanov, 29, has been arrested and charged with murder.

Mr Kirby, 50, originally from Cowley, saw the man coming out of a supermarket and described what he then saw as “horrific”.

He said he heard shouting and screaming.

The former Cheney School pupil said: “There was this hispanic-looking guy, very scruffy, walking behind me and muttering to himself.

“He was ambling along with what I thought was a joke shop sort of prop head. I didn’t realise it wasn’t a fake.”

Mr Kirby, a writer for tenerifemagazine.com, moved across the road to try to take a picture of the man, but then a group of people started to chase after the man.

He said: “He started to run across the road too, but then the security guards rugby tackled him and held him there until the police came. There was a queue of people trying to get the boot in and kick the hell out of him, but the police stopped that.”

Mr Kirby, an Oxford City supporter, reported on ice hockey results for the Oxford Mail and wrote for our sister paper The Oxford Times.

He moved to Tenerife 10 years ago but regularly visits family in his home city.

He said it was only afterwards that he realised the horror of what he had seen.

He said: “It was this slow realisation. At first I thought ‘it couldn’t be, it just can’t be’, it’s not something you have ever seen before.

“And when the realisation finally kicked in, I was horrified and distraught about the whole thing. It’s horrific.”

Suspect Mr Deyanov, who was living rough, appeared before a magistrate on the island on Saturday night. He has been remanded in custody, charged with murder.

Yesterday it emerged a terrified Ms Mills-Westley had sought refuge at a local employment centre just minutes before she was slain.

She is understood to have told social services officials she was being followed.

Ms Mills-Westley had been living in Tenerife after retiring from her job as a road safety officer with Norfolk County Council.

Spanish newspapers reported a judge issued a search and arrest order for Deyanov just three days before the killing.