A man raped and murdered a “vulnerable” student in an act of sexual violence before dumping her body into a river, a court heard today.

Pawel Relowicz, 26, is alleged to have killed 21-year-old Libby Squire on February 1 2019 and to have committed rape between January 31 and February 1. His trial began on Tuesday.

Relowicz had come across Squire who was “drunk”, “likely hypothermic” and “in deep distress”, on a road in Hull and driven her away from safety to a remote playing field, Sheffield Crown Court heard.

Squire’s body was recovered by a lifeboat around seven weeks later after being spotted in the Humber Estuary by the skipper of a fishing boat.

Relowicz denies raping and murdering the Hull University student.

Richard Wright, opening the case for the prosecution, said Squire had “seemingly disappeared” on the freezing cold night of January 31 2019 after being refused entry to a nightclub.

He said: “She was drunk, she was likely hypothermic, and she was in deep distress. She had lost her house keys, she was crying, she had fallen repeatedly to the floor as she tried to walk and she was extremely vulnerable.”

Wright told the jury that some “good citizens” tried to help Squire, but she became agitated and they left her by the roadside.

He said: “From there she seemingly vanished.

“One man knew very well where Libby had gone. That man is the defendant, Pawel Relowicz.

“He lived with his family in a residential street a short distance from Libby’s home and he had come across her, drunk and vulnerable as she was, on Beverley Road, in Hull.”

Wright added that Relowicz drove Squire to nearby playing fields at Oak Road – a “remote spot” that he was familiar with and chose “so that he would not be disturbed”.

He said: “At Oak Road, having exited his vehicle, we say that Pawel Relowicz raped Libby and that he killed her, causing her death during that act of sexual violence, which culminated in his putting her, dead or dying, into the cold waters of the River Hull that bordered the edge of that playing field.

“It was from there that Libby’s body travelled into the Humber and then out to sea to be recovered by the lifeboat on March 20.”

Squire’s disappearance prompted a huge search by hundreds of uniformed officers, as well as search specialists, dog handlers and underwater officers.

The philosophy student, originally from High Wycombe, had been dropped off in a taxi near her home at 11.29pm on the night she went missing and was seen 10 minutes later on CCTV near a bench on Beverley Road, where a motorist stopped to offer help. She is believed to have remained in the area until 12.09am the day after.

Though police had at first suggested Squire did not enter her home after being dropped off, her mother Lisa reportedly clarified in a Facebook post that she had entered the property before subsequently vanishing.

She wrote: “She got out of the taxi at her house. She was home… simple.”

In the aftermath of Squire’s disappearance, around 200 students and staff from Hull University held a vigil in the rain to show solidarity for her family and the search.

Throughout the hearing, Relowicz sat listening to the prosecution opening statement in the glass-fronted dock, flanked by three prison officers.

He was wearing a dark blue suit over a white shirt with a royal blue tie and was sporting a green face mask.

Wright told the court that the defendant was living with his wife and two children in Raglan Street, Hull.

He worked as a butcher at Karro Foods, in Malton, North Yorkshire, he said.

Squire’s parents – Lisa and Russ – looked down on proceedings from the public gallery above the jury of five men and seven women.

The trial continues.