After 12 days of evidence a jury is today expected to deliver its verdict in the trial of a Southampton man charged with a stack of offences including arson and burglary.

Arnett Dill, 43, from Leacraft Hill Road, is accused of breaking into five stores last Christmas and stealing $80,000 worth of goods, including jewellery and electrical equipment. He also faces five alternative charges of receiving stolen property as well as two counts of causing wilful damage and one count of arson after the Audio Visual Electronics store on Cambridge Road, Somerset was burnt down following a burglary.

Yesterday Puisne Judge Norma Wade Miller told the jury of six men and six women that much of the evidence was circumstantial -- the burglars left no evidence at the scene of each crime.

But she added that, the stronger the circumstantial evidence, the easier it was to infer facts.

"You can break in your hand a strand of cotton but the more strands of cotton there are the more difficult it is to break,'' she said.

Dill was arrested at the rear of the Trimingham's store in Paget in the early hours of January 4, along with an accomplice, John Jefferis, who has since been jailed after pleading guilty to three of the offences.

Dill was wearing thick gardening gloves at the time of his arrest and there were also a number of tools found on the passenger seat of his car, Jefferis was also carrying tools when arrested. Dill has maintained throughout that the two men were on their way to a party.

Police also unearthed the stolen property at Dill's office on Front Street, his car and his father's home.

When giving testimony Dill claimed that Jefferis was responsible for all the burglaries and had given him the stolen goods in lieu of rent.

But when cross examined about his alibi by prosecutor Patrick Doherty Dill frequently contradicted himself.

The jury is expected to be sent out later this morning after Puisne Judge Mrs.

Miller has completed her directions.