London, March 18 : Princess Diana's former butler Paul Burrell took a bloodstained engagement ring off her dead body and kept it, the inquest into her death has heard.

Burrell's former bodyguard Michael Faux told the jury that he had been "disgusted" after hearing the revelation.

Faux said that Burrell told him he took the ring in the Paris hospital where Diana died following a car crash in August 1997.

"He said that he took it from the body in Paris,” the Telegraph quoted Faux, as saying.

Nicholas Hilliard, representing the coroner, said: "Did he have any way of demonstrating this was hers?"

Faux replied: "Yes, there was still blood on the ring and he could prove it was hers by the DNA."

He told the jury that Burrell only told him of the engagement ring after he agreed to sign a confidentiality agreement.

The jury has heard that Diana received a gold Bulgari friendship ring from Dodi Fayed, which she wore on her right hand.

In a written statement to the court, Burrell said: "There was no conversation about a ring. I have never referred to the Bulgari friendship ring as an engagement ring. This is not my opinion of what the ring was.

"I have never told anybody that I have had possession of that ring. I am not in possession of that ring." (ANI)