The jury in the Soham murder trial must reach their verdicts on the evidence alone, "uninfluenced" by emotion, the judge told them today.
Holly and Jessica
Mr Justice Moses said it was "idle to pretend" that the deaths of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman did not provoke an emotional response.
He said: "The judgment you make is a judgment you must make on the evidence, uninfluenced by the emotion that a case such as this inevitably arouses. "It is idle to pretend this is not a tragic case."
He gave an example, saying: "While the families of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman searched that night for the lost girls, the defendant Ian Huntley started to destroy the evidence and left those girls in a ditch.
"I only mention that because it is part of the case that it is bound to create an emotional reaction and any emotional reaction to the events cannot and must not influence your verdict."
The judge told the jury of seven women and five men that they alone were the judges of the facts in the case.
He said: "You decide where the truth lies.
"No more and no less is required of you. "Do not be overawed by the gravity of the allegation."
The judge began his address to the jury on the 26th day of the trial, after lawyers for co-defendants Mr Ian Huntley and Ms Maxine Carr finished their closing speeches.
The jury has been told it will be sent out to begin to consider its verdicts tomorrow.
Mr Justice Moses addressing the Soham jury
Mr Huntley (29) a former caretaker at Soham Village College, denies murdering the 10-year-olds on Sunday August 4th last year but has admitted a single charge of conspiring to pervert the course of justice. The jury has heard he admits Holly died accidentally in his bath and that he killed Jessica as he tried to silence her screams, although he insists he did not mean to kill her.
He bundled their bodies into his car, dumped them in the remote ditch where they were found 13 days later, cut off their clothes and torched their corpses. His ex-girlfriend Ms Carr (26) a former classroom assistant in the youngsters' class, denies conspiring to pervert the course of justice and two counts of assisting an offender.
She has told the jury that she lied to protect her then fiancé, giving him a false alibi, but insisted she never suspected he could be involved in the girls' disappearance.