Mikaeel Kular's mother Rosdeep 'murdered son and hid body in suitcase', prosecution claims

She did not enter a plea to a murder charge in court on Tuesday

A police handout of missing three-year-old Mikaeel-Kular (Police Handout )

The mother of three-year-old Mikaeel Kular has appeared in court charged with his murder.

Rosdeep Kular, 34, is accused of beating her son to death over four days of abuse and dumping the body before sparking a futile police search by reporting him missing.

According to the indictment, seen by STV, she is accused of punching Mikaeel in the head and body, hitting him against a hard object and causing blunt force trauma injuries at the family’s flat in Edinburgh between 12 and 15 January.

She is accused of failing to get the boy medical help and attempting to hide the body by wrapping it in a duvet cover and stuffing it inside a suitcase.

Kular is then said to have put Mikaeel's body in her car boot and driven first to his school and then to a relative's home, where she hid it in woods.

The prosecution alleges she reported Mikaeel missing to police in an attempt to cover up the child's death.

She has been charged with murder and attempting to defeat the ends of justice – the Scottish equivalent of perverting the course of justice.

Kular, who is appearing under her married name of Adekoya, has four other children, including Mikaeel’s twin sister.

She did not enter a plea in a preliminary hearing at Edinburgh’s High Court on Tuesday and she is next due to appear on 25 July.

Hundreds of volunteers joined the search for Mikaeel after he was reported missing from his home in the Drylaw area of Edinburgh on 16 January.

His body was found in woods behind a house in Kirkcaldy the next day, sparking an outpouring of grief across Scotland.

Floral tributes, soft toys and candles were placed in small park near his home and hundreds gathered on both banks of the Forth to release balloons and light candles in his memory.

Another vigil was held near his home in May on what would have been his fourth birthday.