Jordan McSweeney, who murdered Zara Aleena in Ilford, east London, in June 2022, has won a Court of Appeal bid to reduce the minimum term of his life sentence – despite walking out of the hearing part way through.
McSweeney killed the 35-year-old law graduate as she walked home from a night out in Ilford, east London, early on June 26 last year.
The killer refused to attend his sentencing hearing for the murder last December, being handed a life sentence with a minimum term of 38 years in his absence. He had previously admitted sexually assaulting and murdering Ms Aleena.
But a Court of Appeal judge has now reduced the minimum tariff to 33 years instead.
The Lady Chief Justice Lady Carr, sitting with Mrs Justice McGowan and Mrs Justice Ellenbogen, said: ‘Having correctly found that Ms Aleena must have been rendered unconscious at an early stage in the attack, the judge had lacked a sufficient evidential basis on which to be sure that there had been additional mental or physical suffering such as to justify an increase in the 30-year starting point.’
McSweeney killed Zara Aleena (pictured) as she walked home from a night out in Ilford, east London, early on June 26 last year
Jordan McSweeney had been sentenced to serve a minimum of 38 years in prison, which has now been reduced to 33 years
At the beginning of the hearing, his barrister George Carter-Stephenson KC said: ‘At the outset can I make it clear that it is accepted that the attack and murder in this case was particularly savage and brutal and nothing I intend to say in this address is in any way meant to detract from that.’
The barrister said the sentencing judge, Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb, had wrongly factored in the ‘aggravating features’ in the case.
Mr Carter-Stephenson argued the murder itself was not premeditated.
He told the court: ‘He was obviously stalking women on that night, following them and looking for an opportunity.
‘The attack was an opportunistic act rather than anything that was planned in advance though there was clearly a sexual encounter in mind.
‘He planned to look for a sexual encounter, with or without consent.’
Mr Carter-Stephenson then said the ‘the resistance put up by the victim’ caused ‘the level of aggression to rise’ during the assault.
‘I don’t mean to put any blame on the victim at all,’ he added.
Around 45 minutes after the start of his bid to reduce the minimum term of his life sentence, the hearing was paused following McSweeney’s sudden departure.
An unnamed prison officer, who appeared on the videolink with McSweeney, said: ‘He’s heard enough and has got everything he requires in his cell.’
However, Oliver Glasgow KC, for the Crown Prosecution Service, said the suggestion McSweeney had not intended to kill Ms Aleena was ‘unsustainable’.
He told the court McSweeney had spent two hours stalking several women before turning his attention to Ms Aleena.
Ms Aleena, 35, who was training to be a solicitor, was found struggling to breathe and later died in hospital
Mr Glasgow said in written submissions: ‘The submission that the intention to murder Ms Aleena was formed ‘on the spur of the moment’ flies in the face of the applicant’s behaviour preceding the violence.
‘The sexual assault of Ms Aleena was the culmination of hours of planning and premeditation.’
The Old Bailey previously heard McSweeney stalked Ms Aleena along Cranbrook Road before grabbing her from behind and dragging her into a driveway.
The attack, caught on grainy CCTV, lasted nine minutes and resulted in 46 separate injuries.
Ms Aleena, who was training to be a solicitor, was found struggling to breathe and later died in hospital.
Mr Glasgow described the attack as ‘utterly abhorrent’ and said the sentencing judge was right to find McSweeney had no mitigation aside from his guilty pleas.
This is a breaking news story and is being updated.