AN ice-cream salesman has claimed in court that he was falsely implicated in a Worcester firebomb attack because his girlfriend's family turned against him.

Sajad Hussain told a jury that as a Muslim he should not have had a relationship with an English woman or had sex before marriage.

He said his own family rejected Jody Boulton, the mother of his child, and he had tried to keep the romance a secret.

Hussain, aged 18, insisted that led in turn to Miss Boulton's family turning against him and her inventing evidence that he confessed to the firebombing.

Miss Boulton had told Worcester Crown Court that the teenager phoned her after 3am to say he was "going round" to the Ronkswood house where the attack occurred. Six people escaped from the property after firebombs began a blaze on August 2 last year.

Hussain, of Rainbow Hill, Worcester, denies five counts of attempted murder, arson with intent to endanger life and perverting the course of justice.

The prosecution alleges that he tried to get Miss Boulton to drop her police evidence in a letter smuggled out of jail.

Hussain said he only gave her advice about retracting her statement after she told him the police "were putting words into her mouth".

Questioned by Malcolm Parkes, prosecuting, about the gold-coloured Nissan Micra he drove that night which was allegedly spotted near the house, Hussain said he was "definitely not" out in it in the early hours.

He also claimed that a witness who picked him out on an identity parade as the driver had been "put up to it" by police.

Hussain was unable to pinpoint why police had a grudge but agreed his case was that evidence of his thumbprint on a firebomb wick found at the scene was planted by officers.

Mr Parkes accused Hussain of mounting "a hare-brained scheme" when his threats failed to get a 15-year-old girl to drop a sex attack complaint against him.

The trial continues.