A man jointly accused of the double murder of two drug dealers insisted it was a “stitch-up” and that he had nothing to do with the killing.

Thomas Haigh is charged alongside Ross Stone, 28, of shooting dead David Griffiths, 35, from Plymouth, and Brett Flournoy, 31, from Merseyside, at a farm near St Austell, Cornwall.

Prosecutors say the murder at Sunny Corner, Trenance Downs, was driven by drugs debts. However, Haigh told Truro Crown Court yesterday that he was entirely innocent and his version of events from June 16 last year was “God’s honest truth”.

Under cross-examination from prosecutor Paul Dunkels QC about the exact circumstances, 26-year-old Haigh insisted: “I’m being stitched up, I really am.”

Mr Dunkels pressed Haigh about a police interview during which he claimed to have been given a lift on the day in question but said he didn’t know the driver. But in the witness box, Haigh admitted he did know the man, but hadn’t wanted to involve him.

“In my eyes, he was an irrelevance. He had given me a lift and that was it.”

Haigh said his solicitor had advised him to “miss it out” and that personally he didn’t “want to start name-dropping”. He conceded there might have been some inaccuracies in what he said during the police interview, but that he was telling the truth overall. “I might have a few things wrong,” he said. “I didn’t know what they were going on about.”

Haigh said he was exhausted after voluntarily attending Huddersfield Police Station, then being transported down to Launceston Police Station overnight.

“I had been arrested. I [only] had a few hours’ sleep. I’m sorry if I got things wrong.”

At the end of giving evidence, Haigh repeated his insistence that he was innocent, saying: “Do you know how heartbreaking it is being called a liar and a murderer?”

Last week, his co-accused, Stone, said he believed Haigh was the killer. The court was previously told that Mr Griffiths and Mr Flournoy were shot at close range, then dragged into the back of the latter’s van, which was pushed into a pit and set on fire before being covered with earth.

Haigh, formerly of Huddersfield, and Stone, who at the time lived at Sunny Corner, both deny two counts of murder. Stone admits obstructing a coroner by burying the bodies. The trial continues.