David Smith: ‘Honey Monster’ killer handed life sentence for double jeopardy murder

Published

2 years ago

May 26, 2023

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A ‘sadistic’ sexual predator nicknamed the ‘Honey Monster’ by colleagues has been jailed for life for the murder of an escort – exactly 30 years after he was cleared of the killing.

David Smith, 67, was acquitted of the 1991 murder of Sarah Crump, 33, at a trial in 1993.

The lorry driver went on to commit an almost identical murder of another sex worker, 21-year-old Amanda Walker, for which he was convicted in 1999 and has now served 24 years of a life sentence.

After being convicted of Ms Walker’s murder, Ms Crump’s mother, Pat Rhodes, warned: “I said at the trial he would kill again.

“I truly believe Smith to be guilty of the murder of my daughter, Sarah.

While on remand awaiting trial for Ms Walker’s murder, Smith boasted to an inmate that he had “got away with it”.

Court of Appeal judges ordered Smith should be retried for Ms Crump’s murder after “new and compelling evidence” emerged.

He was retried after the centuries-old double jeopardy rule – which meant a defendant, once acquitted, could not be tried for the same crime – was scrapped.

The law change in 2005 has allowed prosecutors and police to bring offenders to justice if there is new and compelling evidence against them.

Smith – known to colleagues as “The Honey Monster” or “Lurch” due to his heavy build and 6ft 3in height – denied murder but was this week convicted by jurors at Inner London Crown Court.

On Friday, he was sentenced to life with a minimum 27 years behind bars – less the 479 days he spent on remand in the 1990s – meaning he will serve at least 25 years and 251 days in prison.

Smith previously raped a young mother at knifepoint in 1976 and falsely imprisoned another woman in a car around 10 years later, jurors heard.

He regularly played card games with Harold Shipman while serving time at HMP Wakefield, the 2005 inquest of the serial killer GP heard.

Passing sentence for Ms Crump’s murder on Friday, the judge, Mr Justice Bryan, said the “abhorrent murder” was both “sexual and sadistic in nature”.

“I have no doubt your pre-meditated and planned intention that night… was to kill and sexually mutilate an escort to satisfy your perverted and sadistic sexual desires,” he said.

Smith, branded a “habitual and dishonest liar”, had a “history of escalating sexual violence against women” since he was a teenager in the 1970s, the judge said.

The killing of Ms Crump was part of a “pattern of violence and sexual offending against, but not limited to, sex workers.”

Ms Crump’s family, including her two sisters, Joanne Platt and Suzanne Wright, together with Detective Inspector Jill McTigue, who led the initial murder investigation, were present in court for the hearing.

Mr Justice Bryan said he hoped the the sentence would give them “some closure”, telling Smith they would be “safe in the knowledge you have been brought to justice and are likely to spend the rest of your life in prison.”

A victim impact statement was read by Ms Platt on behalf of Ms Crump’s relatives including her parents, who have now died.

She was described as a “bubbly”, “popular” and a “trusting person” who “believed in the good of people”.

Ms Platt said: “I can’t adequately express the pain of knowing what my sister endured.

“My family will never come to terms with the brutal savagery of Sarah’s murder.

“Even after 32 years having to listen to the details of the attack against Sarah was excruciating.

“This was always so very important to pursue, to finally see justice for Sarah.

“We would like to remember Sarah for who she was to us – the sister with the most amazing smile, a funny, thoughtful aunt and the daughter who was one of the best three girls in the world.”

“No remorse whatsoever”

Wearing dark glasses with his head bowed, Smith showed no emotion as the sentence was passed.

Mitigating factors for Smith were “thin gruel indeed”, the judge said, adding: “You have shown no remorse whatsoever.”

Ms Crump led a double life, employed as a secretary in the chiropody department at Wimbledon Hospital in south west London while also working as an escort.

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Victim turned to sex work to pay for fertility treatment

The former psychiatric nurse turned to sex work in a bid to fund fertility treatment and fulfil her “strong desire to become a mother”, said her family, who had no idea she was an escort.

Smith, who at the time was living with his parents in Hampton, south west London, visited his victim at her one-bedroom flat in Southall, west London, before murdering her and mutilating her body in the early hours of 29 August, 1991.

Her body was discovered in a shallow leafy grave near the Royal Horticultural Society gardens at Wisley in Surrey – a notorious spot for couples meeting to have sex – six weeks after she went missing in Paddington, west London.

DI McTigue conducted a “professional, rigorous and thorough investigation” but Smith was acquitted on the evidence available in 1993, the court heard.

UK

Diogo Jota: Liverpool players join mourners as Premier League star and his brother Andre Silva buried in Portugal

Published

5 hours ago

July 5, 2025

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Diogo Jota: Liverpool players join mourners as Premier League star and his brother Andre Silva buried in Portugal

Liverpool players past and present have joined the family and friends of Diogo Jota and his brother Andre Silva for their funeral in Portugal.

A service was held in the Igreja Matriz de Gondomar church in their hometown of Gondomar near Porto in northern Portugal on Saturday morning.

Mourners lined the streets and some in the crowd clapped as the brothers’ coffins were carried into the church.

The funeral – in pictures

Jota, 28, leaves behind his wife of only 11 days, Rute Cardoso, and three young children.

His younger brother, 25, was an attacking midfielder for Penafiel in the second tier of Portuguese football.

Liverpool manager Arne Slot, captain Virgil Van Dijk and teammates including Andy Robertson, Conor Bradley, Ryan Gravenberch, Cody Gakpo, Curtis Jones, Darwin Nunez and Joe Gomez were seen at the service.

Former teammates Jordan Henderson, James Milner and Fabinho were also there.

Van Dijk carried a red wreath with Jota’s number 20, while Robertson had a wreath featuring number 30, Silva’s number at Penafiel.

Some of Jota’s teammates in the Portuguese national side also attended, including Bruno Fernandes, of Manchester United, Ruben Dias and Bernardo Silva, of Manchester City, Joao Felix and Renato Veiga, of Chelsea, Nelson Semedo, from Wolves, Joao Moutinho and Rui Patricio.

Ruben Neves was one of the pallbearers after flying in from Florida where he played for Al Hilal in the Club World Cup quarter-final on Friday night.

‘More than a friend’

In a post published on Instagram before the service, he told Jota he had been “more than a friend, we’re family, and we won’t stop being that way just because you’ve decided to sign a contract a little further away from us!”

Jota’s fellow Liverpool midfielder, Alexis Mac Allister, said on Instagram: “I can’t believe it. I’ll always remember your smiles, your anger, your intelligence, your camaraderie, and everything that made you a person. It hurts so much; we’ll miss you. Rest in peace, dear Diogo.”

Porto FC president Andre Villas-Boas and Portugal national team manager Roberto Martinez were also in attendance.

‘With us forever’

Speaking after the ceremony, Martinez said the period since their deaths had been “really, really sad days, as you can imagine, but today we showed we are a large, close family.

“Their spirit will be with us forever.”

The service was private, but the words spoken by the Bishop of Porto, Manuel Linda, were broadcast to those standing outside the church.

He told Jota’s children, who were not at the service, that he was praying for them specifically, as well as their mother and grandparents.

“There are no words, but there are feelings,” he said, adding: “We also suffer a lot and we are with you emotionally.”

The brothers died after a Lamborghini they were travelling in burst into flames following a suspected tyre blowout in the early hours of Thursday morning.

No other vehicles are said to have been involved in the incident.

Liverpool have delayed the return of their players for pre-season following Jota’s death and players past and present paid tribute to him and his brother on social media.

Flowers have been left outside Anfield, where flags have been lowered to half-mast and all club shops, museums and tours have been closed until Monday.

UK

Rachel Reeves hints at tax rises in autumn budget after welfare bill U-turn

Published

8 hours ago

July 5, 2025

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Rachel Reeves hints at tax rises in autumn budget after welfare bill U-turn

Rachel Reeves has hinted that taxes are likely to be raised this autumn after a major U-turn on the government’s controversial welfare bill.

Sir Keir Starmer’s Universal Credit and Personal Independent Payment Bill passed through the House of Commons on Tuesday after multiple concessions and threats of a major rebellion.

MPs ended up voting for only one part of the plan: a cut to universal credit (UC) sickness benefits for new claimants from £97 a week to £50 from 2026/7.

Initially aimed at saving £5.5bn, it now leaves the government with an estimated £5.5bn black hole – close to breaching Ms Reeves’s fiscal rules set out last year.

In an interview with The Guardian, the chancellor did not rule out tax rises later in the year, saying there were “costs” to watering down the welfare bill.

“I’m not going to [rule out tax rises], because it would be irresponsible for a chancellor to do that,” Ms Reeves told the outlet.

“We took the decisions last year to draw a line under unfunded commitments and economic mismanagement.

“So we’ll never have to do something like that again. But there are costs to what happened.”

Meanwhile, The Times reported that, ahead of the Commons vote on the welfare bill, Ms Reeves told cabinet ministers the decision to offer concessions would mean taxes would have to be raised.

The outlet reported that the chancellor said the tax rises would be smaller than those announced in the 2024 budget, but that she is expected to have to raise tens of billions more.

It comes after Ms Reeves said she was “totally” up to continuing as chancellor after appearing tearful at Prime Minister’s Questions.

Criticising Sir Keir for the U-turns on benefit reform during PMQs, Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said the chancellor looked “absolutely miserable”, and questioned whether she would remain in post until the next election.

Sir Keir did not explicitly say that she would, and Ms Badenoch interjected to say: “How awful for the chancellor that he couldn’t confirm that she would stay in place.”

In her first comments after the incident, Ms Reeves said she was having a “tough day” before adding: “People saw I was upset, but that was yesterday.

“Today’s a new day and I’m just cracking on with the job.”

Sir Keir also told Sky News’ political editor Beth Rigby on Thursday that he “didn’t appreciate” that Ms Reeves was crying in the Commons.

“In PMQs, it is bang, bang, bang,” he said. “That’s what it was yesterday.

“And therefore, I was probably the last to appreciate anything else going on in the chamber, and that’s just a straightforward human explanation, common sense explanation.”

UK

Diogo Jota and Andre Silva’s funeral in pictures

Published

10 hours ago

July 5, 2025

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Diogo Jota and Andre Silva's funeral in pictures

The family and friends of Diogo Jota and his brother Andre Silva have been joined by Liverpool stars past and present and other Portuguese players at the pair’s funeral near Porto.

The Liverpool forward, 28, and his brother died in a car crash in Spain on Thursday.

Pictures below show the funeral at the Igreja Matriz de Gondomar church in the town of Gondomar near Porto. Click here for our liveblog coverage of the day’s events.