When Ben Field, a 26-year-old preacher’s son, first met Peter Farquhar, 66, he says he had one thing on his mind: the older man’s money.

Field, along with 31-year-old magician Martyn Smith, is on trial for Farquhar’s murder in a British courtroom and testified for the first time this week, admitting that he lied to “gaslight” Farquhar. The men are also on trial for attempting to murder Ann Moore-Martin, a never-married 83-year-old retired headmistress described as lonely.

Field, now 28, told Oxford Crown Court he was in sexual relationships with both of the elderly retirees, and admits lying to get them to change their wills to leave everything to him, which both did. But he said he did not kill them. Farquhar died of alcohol poisoning at the age of 69 in 2015 and Moore-Martin died of complications of unexplained seizures at the age of 83 two years later.