Two London police officers were sentenced to two years and nine months in jail for taking photos of two murdered sisters and sharing the pictures on social media, the Associated Press reported. A 19-year-old British man reportedly obsessed with demons has already been sentenced to up to 35 years in prison for the June 2020 killings of Bibaa Henry, 46, and Nicole Smallman, 27.
Deniz Jaffer and Jamie Lewis, the officers, had been directed to guard the site where the bodies of Henry and Smallman were discovered in northwest London’s Fryent Country Park, according to the AP. But Jaffer left his position, entered the bushes where the bodies were found, and then took pictures of them from about 12 feet away, The Guardian reported.
Jaffer sent some of the photos to Lewis, who edited his face into one to create a “selfie-style” image with the women, the AP reported. In a WhatsApp group message that included 41 London officers, Lewis sent one of the images and referred to the women as “dead birds full of stab wounds.” Meanwhile, Jaffer sent photos to a WhatsApp group that contained some of his and his wife’s friends.
Jaffer resigned from the Metropolitan Police in August, and Lewis was fired by a disciplinary tribunal, The Guardian reported.
Prosecutor Joel Smith told the Central Criminal Court of England and Wales, also referred to as the Old Bailey, that on top of leaving their posts to protect the bodies, the officers risked contaminating the crime scene by approaching to take the photos. This concern was noted by the defense of Danyal Hussein, the man convicted of murdering the women, The Guardian reported.
“The offending stripped Ms Henry and Ms Smallman of dignity in death,” Smith said. “That factor is more weighty given that the offenders were charged with protecting their bodies.”
Hussein believed that killing the women would help him with the lottery, according to the AP.
For more reporting from the Associated Press, see below.
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Lewis and Jaffer both pleaded guilty to misconduct in a public office.
“It is appalling and inexplicable conduct,” Judge Mark Lucraft said. “Here, the two of you not only violated the police cordon with the effect that had on the scene and on the investigation, but then wholly disregarded the privacy of the two victims of horrific violence and their families for what can only have been some cheap thrill, kudos, a kick or some form of bragging right by taking images and then passing them to others.”
The women’s mother, Mina Smallman, said the officers’ actions were a “betrayal of catastrophic proportions.”
“Jaffer and Lewis callously and without any regard for our dead girls’ bodies committed, to my mind, a sacrilegious act,” she said. “We were horrified. I had never heard of anything so macabre.”
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