Jordan McSweeney, 29 of no fixed address, was sentenced at the Old Bailey on Wednesday, 14 December having pleaded guilty to murder and sexual assault at the same court on Friday, 18 November.
Zara was walking home along Cranbrook Road in Ilford in the early hours of Sunday, 26 June when she was approached from behind and dragged into a driveway by McSweeney. He subjected her to a brutal attack, returning multiple times to deliver repeated blows, leaving her with significant injuries.
Neighbours and passers-by tried their best to provide first aid to Zara until the arrival of paramedics, with one person giving her CPR. She was rushed to hospital but sadly died later that morning. She was just 35.
Zara’s aunt, Farah Naz, said on behalf of the family: “Today´s sentencing protects the public from a man who cannot and must not live freely in the world.
“His extreme indifference both to Zara´s life and for the law makes him a very dangerous man. We have some retribution, but no peace.
“There are questions to be answered, there are lessons to be learnt, and changes to be made.
“Zara´s life was senselessly and brutally crushed, and today, like every other day we live with the horror she was forced to face.
“Zara was the light, the warmth, the birdsong, the laughter in our family. We live with a profound loss each day and each day we are destroyed a little more.
“We are deeply touched by the kindness we have felt from so many, and this is testament to the power of Zara´s spirit.”
The investigation found that McSweeney had spent the evening of 25 June in a bar in Ilford, drinking heavily, before being ejected at around 23:00hrs.
Over the course of the next three hours, he can be seen on CCTV footage to roam around Ilford and nearby Manor Park, visibly drunk, following multiple lone women, two for prolonged periods.
One of the women was seen on camera running down a residential street to get away.
Shortly after 02:00hrs, McSweeney spotted Zara on Cranbrook Road. He can be seen to follow her for around 10 minutes before attacking her in the driveway of a house near to the junction with Cranbrook Rise, causing the serious injuries from which she would tragically not recover.
Following Zara’s death, detectives from the Met’s Specialist Crime Command launched an immediate investigation and identified footage that showed McSweeney – who at the time had not been identified by name – as the attacker.
His image was circulated within the Met and to the public. An officer who had dealt with him for a previous offence was able to provide detectives with his name and a fingerprint found in blood at the scene was compared with police records to confirm a match.
Simultaneously, detectives were examining footage from multiple CCTV cameras, tracking McSweeney as he calmly left the scene of the murder, walked back along Cranbrook Road and climbed over a fence into nearby Valentines Park where, at the time, a fairground was based.
On the afternoon of Monday, 27 June – around 36 hours after the attack – officers were sent to the fairground to make further enquiries. They confirmed McSweeney was staying on site and at 14:40hrs, arrested him on suspicion of murder and rape.
While he was in custody, further CCTV enquiries were carried out at the fairground. Footage showed that hours after he had murdered Zara, he walked across the site wearing the same vest top as in the footage of the attack, carrying a bag. Minutes later he returned to his caravan, having discarded the bag and the vest.
These items were later found elsewhere on the site, with the bag containing the shoes and other items he was wearing when he killed Zara.
In the early hours of Wednesday, 29 June, McSweeney was charged with murder, rape and robbery. The latter offence related to the removal of Zara’s belongings, many of which were found discarded on his route away from the crime scene.
When he eventually pleaded guilty on 18 November, the indictment was amended to two counts – murder and sexual assault, rather than the original offences. McSweeney accepted, as part of his plea, that the murder was sexually motivated.
