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Wednesday, February 26, 2025

Zara Aleena murder: Jordan McSweeney jailed for at least 38 years

Zara AleenaMet Police

A sexual predator branded a “danger to any woman” has been jailed for at least 38 years for the murder and sexual assault of Zara Aleena as she walked home from a night out in east London.

Jordan McSweeney, 29, admitted killing and sexually assaulting the 35-year-old law graduate in Ilford on 26 June.

Ms Aleena had been “savagely” kicked and stamped on by McSweeney, who followed a number of women that night.

His refusal to be in the dock showed “no spine whatsoever”, the judge said.

Jordan McSweeney

BBC Sport

In a televised sentencing, Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb told the Old Bailey that McSweeney – who would not come up from the court’s cells – had carried out the attack with “sickening deliberation”.

Giving him a mandatory life sentence, the judge said she did not believe McSweeney’s actions on the night of the attack were an “aberration”. She described him as a “pugnacious and deeply violent man with a propensity to violence”.

She said: “It was a steep and sudden escalation of violence that had simmered in his life for many years.”

Map showing site of attack in Ilford

The defendant, from Dagenham in east London, had only recently been released from prison when he carried out the attack, just after 02:15 BST.

Ms Aleena was discovered by a couple on a driveway on Cranbrook Road. She was partially naked and struggling to breathe, having sustained 46 separate injuries in the nine-minute assault.

She received medical treatment for more than an hour on the street before she was taken to the Royal London Hospital where she died later the same morning.

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The Old Bailey was shown CCTV footage of the brutal attack – McSweeney’s reason for not appearing in court was that he “does not want to relive” what happened that night, his defence barrister George Carter-Stephenson KC said.

After the attack, McSweeney took some of Ms Aleena’s clothes, keys, phone and purse.

Speaking after the sentencing hearing, Det Ch Insp Dave Whellams, who led the murder investigation, said: “This was a ferocious and repetitive attack that shocked even experienced murder detectives.”

He added: “Jordan McSweeney is not a sophisticated criminal.

“He attacked Zara out in the open on a residential street and other than a clumsy effort to hide a bag containing his belongings, he did not try to cover his tracks.”

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