Man ‘decapitated and dismembered’ couple before moving remains in a suitcase, court hears
A man “decapitated and dismembered” a couple in London before freezing their severed heads and carrying the rest of their remains to Bristol in a suitcase, a court has heard.
Yostin Andres Mosquera is on trial accused of the murders of Albert Alfonso, 62, and Paul Longworth, 71, in July last year, in the flat the couple shared in Shepherd’s Bush, west London.
Mr Alfonso was stabbed to death while being filmed and footage shows Mosquera – described by the prosecution as a “pornographic performer” – singing and dancing in the aftermath of the attack, the Old Bailey heard.
Mosquera admitted the manslaughter of Mr Alfonso at a hearing on Tuesday but denies, and is being tried on, both murder charges.
Prosecutor Deanna Heer told jurors Mosquera “could hardly deny” killing Mr Alfonso and said the attack took place while the defendant and victim were having sex.
But Mosquera blames Mr Alfonso for the death of Mr Longworth, the court heard.
Mr Alfonso liked “extreme sex” and engaged in acts with other men, which Mr Longworth knew about and accepted but had “nothing to do with”, jurors were told.
The defendant is said to have visited the UK more than once, spending time with the couple and engaging in sex acts with Mr Alfonso in exchange for payment. The couple also visited him in his home country, Colombia.
When Mosquera visited the UK in June last year, he “had other matters on his mind,” the prosecutor said.
Analysis of his computer allegedly showed that shortly before his trip to the UK, the defendant searched for the value of the couple’s west London home, browsed for a chest freezer and copied spreadsheets with Mr Alfonso’s online banking passwords.
He is alleged to have killed Mr Longworth – who was “attacked with a hammer to the back of the head,” the prosecution said – and later Mr Alfonso, in their home on 8 July 2024.
“Albert Alfonso had been repeatedly stabbed, suffering multiple wounds to his torso, his body, and his face and to his neck,” Ms Heer said.
Forensics officers outside the couple’s address after the remains were found last July. Pic: PA
Jury shown footage of victim’s death
Footage of Mr Alfonso’s killing was shown to the jury, who were warned it is “not an easy watch”.
Prosecutor Ms Heer said Mosquera appears “unconcerned” after the “violent assault”.
“As Mr Alfonso lies on the floor dying, the defendant starts singing and breaks into a dance and then makes his way directly to the desktop computer in Mr Alfonso’s room and starts using it… to look at information about Mr Alfonso’s finances,” she said.
The court heard examination of the computer showed Mosquera accessed a spreadsheet containing the couple’s online banking passwords and attempted to access Mr Alfonso’s accounts to move money – including trying to send £4,000 to his own account.
He made numerous cash withdrawals, obtaining at least £900 before the transactions started being declined, the court heard.
Cyclist’s encounter with defendant
At around 11.30pm two days later, a cyclist on the Clifton Suspension Bridge saw Mosquera standing next to a large suitcase and stopped to see if he was OK, the jury heard.
The witness also saw a large silver trunk a few metres away from the defendant, who said the luggage contained car parts.
The prosecutor said: “In fact, the suitcases contained the decapitated and dismembered bodies of Paul Longworth and Albert Alfonso, which the defendant had transported to Bristol from their home in London where they had been killed two days before.”
Police found the couple’s decapitated heads at their flat in a chest freezer, the court heard.
Mr Alfonso, a swimming instructor, and Mr Longworth, a retired handyman, were described by neighbours as a “friendly couple who seemed happy together and who were genuinely fond of one another”.
They entered a civil partnership in February 2023.
The trial continues.
The UK-US trade deal has been signed and is “done”, US President Donald Trump has said as he met Sir Keir Starmer at the G7 summit.
The US president told reporters in Canada: “We signed it, and it’s done. It’s a fair deal for both. It’ll produce a lot of jobs, a lot of income.”
Sir Keir said the document “implements” the deal to cut tariffs on cars and aerospace, describing it as a “really important agreement”.
“So this is a very good day for both of our countries – a real sign of strength,” the prime minister added.
Mr Trump added that the UK was “very well protected” against any future tariffs, saying: “You know why? Because I like them”.
However, he did not say whether levies on British steel exports to the US would be set to 0%, saying “we’re gonna let you have that information in a little while”.
Mr Trump also praised Sir Keir as a “great” prime minister, adding: “We’ve been talking about this deal for six years, and he’s done what they haven’t been able to do.”
He added: “We’re very longtime partners and allies and friends and we’ve become friends in a short period of time.
“He’s slightly more liberal than me to put it mildly… but we get along.”
Sir Keir added that “we make it work”.
As the pair exited a mountain lodge in the Canadian Rockies where the summit is being held, Mr Trump held up a physical copy of the trade agreement to show reporters.
Several leaves of paper fell from the binding, and Sir Keir quickly stooped to pick them up, saying: “A very important document.”
Sir Keir Starmer picks up paper from the UK-US trade deal after Donald Trump dropped it at the G7 summit. Pic: Reuters
The US president also appeared to mistakenly refer to a “trade agreement with the European Union” at one point as he stood alongside the British prime minister.
Mr Trump announced his “Liberation Day” tariffs on countries in April. At the time, he announced 10% “reciprocal” rates on all UK exports – as well as separately announced 25% levies on cars and steel.
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In a joint televised phone call in May, Sir Keir and Mr Trump announced the UK and US had agreed on a trade deal – but added the details were being finalised.
Ahead of the G7 summit, the prime minister said he would meet Mr Trump for “one-on-one” talks, and added the agreement “really matters for the vital sectors that are safeguarded under our deal, and we’ve got to implement that”.
Whitehall officials tried to convince Michael Gove to go to court to cover up the grooming scandal in 2011, Sky News can reveal.
Dominic Cummings, who was working for Lord Gove at the time, has told Sky News that officials in the Department for Education (DfE) wanted to help efforts by Rotherham Council to stop a national newspaper from exposing the scandal.
In an interview with Sky News, Mr Cummings said that officials wanted a “total cover-up”.
Politics latest: Grooming gangs findings unveiled
The revelation shines a light on the institutional reluctance of some key officials in central government to publicly highlight the grooming gang scandal.
In 2011, Rotherham Council approached the Department for Education asking for help following inquiries by The Times. The paper’s then chief reporter, the late Andrew Norfolk, was asking about sexual abuse and trafficking of children in Rotherham.
The council went to Lord Gove’s Department for Education for help. Officials considered the request and then recommended to Lord Gove’s office that the minister back a judicial review which might, if successful, stop The Times publishing the story.
Lord Gove rejected the request on the advice of Mr Cummings. Sources have independently confirmed Mr Cummings’ account.
Education Secretary Michael Gove in 2011. Pic: PA
Mr Cummings told Sky News: “Officials came to me in the Department of Education and said: ‘There’s this Times journalist who wants to write the story about these gangs. The local authority wants to judicially review it and stop The Times publishing the story’.
“So I went to Michael Gove and said: ‘This council is trying to actually stop this and they’re going to use judicial review. You should tell the council that far from siding with the council to stop The Times you will write to the judge and hand over a whole bunch of documents and actually blow up the council’s JR (judicial review).’
“Some officials wanted a total cover-up and were on the side of the council…
“They wanted to help the local council do the cover-up and stop The Times’ reporting, but other officials, including in the DfE private office, said this is completely outrageous and we should blow it up. Gove did, the judicial review got blown up, Norfolk stories ran.”
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Grooming gangs victim speaks out
The judicial review wanted by officials would have asked a judge to decide about the lawfulness of The Times’ publication plans and the consequences that would flow from this information entering the public domain.
A second source told Sky News that the advice from officials was to side with Rotherham Council and its attempts to stop publication of details it did not want in the public domain.
One of the motivations cited for stopping publication would be to prevent the identities of abused children entering the public domain.
There was also a fear that publication could set back the existing attempts to halt the scandal, although incidents of abuse continued for many years after these cases.
Sources suggested that there is also a natural risk aversion amongst officials to publicity of this sort.
Read more on grooming gangs:
What we do and don’t know from the data
A timeline of the scandal
Mr Cummings, who ran the Vote Leave Brexit campaign and was Boris Johnson’s right-hand man in Downing Street, has long pushed for a national inquiry into grooming gangs to expose failures at the heart of government.
He said the inquiry, announced today, “will be a total s**tshow for Whitehall because it will reveal how much Whitehall worked to try and cover up the whole thing.”
He also described Mr Johnson, with whom he has a long-standing animus, as a “moron’ for saying that money spent on inquiries into historic child sexual abuse had been “spaffed up the wall”.
Asked by Sky News political correspondent Liz Bates why he had not pushed for a public inquiry himself when he worked in Number 10 in 2019-20, Mr Cummings said Brexit and then COVID had taken precedence.
“There are a million things that I wanted to do but in 2019 we were dealing with the constitutional crisis,” he said.
The Department for Education and Rotherham Council have been approached for comment.
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