Zara Aleena’s killer was accused of prison attacks, inquest hears

The man who killed Zara Aleena had been accused of a string of offences while he was in prison the year before he murdered her, her inquest has heard.

Jordan McSweeney, a sexual predator with 28 previous convictions, killed the 35-year-old law graduate as she walked home from a night out in Ilford, east London, in June 2022.

He had been released from prison on licence nine days before.

The inquest into her death has heard McSweeney had been accused of violently attacking others and also of drug offences while in prison, but that information was not shared by his prison offender manager, because he said he was not aware.

McSweeney is serving a life sentence with a minimum term of 33 years after admitting Ms Aleena’s murder and sexual assault.

The coroner told the inquest at East London Coroner’s Court that between April and November 2021, 15 or 16 separate reports were recorded of alleged offences McSweeney carried out while in prison.

These included assaulting others using weapons improvised from a tuna tin and the base of a kettle, as well as taking drugs.

One record said he had “bloodshot eyes and slurred speech” and was “too high to walk”.

McSweeney had been in prison for criminal damage, racially aggravated harassment and unlawful possession of a knife.

Emmerson Cole, who spent seven months as the allocated prison offender manager for McSweeney at HMP Pentonville, told jurors he was not aware these incidents had taken place.

Coroner Nadia Persaud asked him: “Isn’t there a system of communication?” Mr Cole replied: “There should be, but it’s not something that happens.”

He said his understanding was that he was tasked with supporting McSweeney, rather than being responsible for him.

Rajeev Thacker, barrister for Ms Aleena’s family, asked Mr Cole why, if he knew there were shortcomings in communication, he had not taken it upon himself to find out more about McSweeney’s behaviour in prison, and to share that information with the community offending manager.

“Not sure,” Mr Cole replied.

Earlier, Mr Cole told jurors he had never met McSweeney and had instead sent him two letters introducing himself and filled out a basic custody screening tool in February 2021.

In his statement, which was read out in court, he said Covid restrictions in place at the time meant meetings with offenders were “severely restricted”.

Mr Thacker put it to Mr Cole that his actions had been “entirely inadequate in respect of your job as a prison officer”.

Mr Cole said he did not agree with this, but accepted his performance “was not 100%”.

A second prison offender manager, Peter Kerr, who was allocated to McSweeney when he was transferred to HMP Belmarsh in April 2022, also gave evidence at the inquest.

He was asked about why he had not proactively chased up why there was no community offender manager allocated to McSweeney, when it was clear that his release date was approaching.

Mr Kerr told the jury he had not considered that within his remit, saying, “the reality is all staff are very busy”, and that he had prioritised other work.

Coroner Nadia Persaud read out a list of alleged offences from McSweeney’s records on the first day of his arrival at Belmarsh in April 2022, including him having an improvised tattoo gun in his cell, threatening staff, and spitting at an officer.

“That’s the first time I’ve seen it,” Mr Kerr said.

The inquest has heard McSweeney had been assessed as being of medium risk to cause serious harm by reoffending.

McSweeney was released from prison on licence on 17 June 2022 and, after breaching the conditions of his licence, his recall to prison was initiated on 22 June.

The inquest has heard that the recall report was not signed until two days later. He was still at large on 26 June, when he murdered Ms Aleena.

The inquest continues.