A MURDER trial was stopped after a judge realised his wife was distantly related to the man who died.

It is the second time Ross Tait, 22, and Ryan Cameron, 25, have stood trial only to find a legal problem has prevented a jury reaching a verdict.

They are due to return to the High Court in Edinburgh in October with a new judge and jury in place.

During a week of evidence the trial heard how David McCardle, 40, known by the nickname Yivil, was found dying behind the then Clubhouse Public Bar in Musselburgh, East Lothian, in August last year.

It is alleged Tait and Cameron, both of Musselburgh, attacked him with a hammer, beer keg and a brush handle.

However, Judge Sean Murphy, QC, said he could no longer hear the case after it emerged his wife's aunt was the sister of Mr McCardle's grandmother.

Although the judge has never met Mr McCardle, he insisted: "I appreciate justice must not only be done, but must be seen to be done."

The judge told the jury he had sent them away at the end of each day last week and told them not to talk about the case.

He said: "Unfortunately, I have observed the same type of silence myself."

But he added: "In the course of a conversation over the weekend it became horribly apparent my wife might have some knowledge of the person involved.

"I now realise something of which I was previously unaware. My wife is related to the family of the deceased in the case."

Mr Murphy said he had known his wife had a number of relatives in the Musselburgh area.

Because of that he had carefully checked the list of Crown witnesses but had not recognised any of the surnames.

He told jurors: "I very much regret circumstances came about in this way."

The judge said he realised witnesses had found it distressing to give evidence and jurors had given up their time.

Last week the trial in Edinburgh heard former pub licensee Richard Ross, 57, tell how Mr McCardle looked as though he could have been hit by a lorry.

He told how he found barman Steven Lindsay, 29, bleeding and half-conscious and duty manager Linda Watters, 44, in tears. A pub regular, former civil servant Derek Robertson, 48, was also injured.

And Mr McCardle's girlfriend, barmaid Paula Cassidy, 23, told how she found him dying.

The trial heard her desperate 999 call. She said: "There was a fight in the pub with a hammer and he got hit with the hammer."

Trouble flared after Tait was told to leave the pub because he was barred, said witnesses.

Tait and Cameron deny charges of murder and serious assault on August 12 last year at the pub – which is now called The Anchor – in Musselburgh's North High Street.

The two claim they were acting in self defence and to protect each other.

A trial in April at the High Court in Glasgow encountered similar difficulties when judge Lady Dorrian told a jury then that she realised she knew one of the witnesses.