A man has been jailed after carrying out a double rape and attempted murder of a stranger while on bail for a similar attack on another middle-aged victim in London.
Aaron Murphy, 21, tried to murder his victim because he “felt like it”, in a brutal attack which left the woman with multiple facial fractures and missing several teeth, a court heard.
On May 21st in Harrow, northwest London, the 49-year-old victim was “minding her own business” in the early hours of the morning when the Jamaica-educated Murphy “grabbed her and ran off with her”, prosecutor Marion Smullen told the Central Criminal Court.
The defendant “smiled menacingly” upon being shown CCTV footage of the attack in court, “before smirking again when the court was shown photographs of the victim with the severe injuries he had inflicted”, according to a report from Court News UK.
“There were fractures through the left orbital floor… Extensive bruising, abrasions to the left side of her neck and ear, abrasions to her left knee and she also had some teeth missing from her upper and lower jaws. Either four or five teeth were lost,” the prosecutor said, adding that the attack left the victim’s “blood and her teeth at the scene”.
Police officers arrived “just in time” after reports from neighbours of a disturbance, and the victim was taken to hospital after reporting being raped twice and beaten in an alleyway.
“She was interviewed after discharge from the hospital, and she described the attack to police and said she thought she was going to die,” said Smullen, adding that Murphy had hit his victim “with so much force that she could not recognise herself”.
He was charged with attempted murder and two counts of rape the following day, when he admitted in a “chilling and disturbing” police interview that he had intended to murder the victim and that he only stopped choking and punching her because officers arrived at the scene.
“I was on my way home and saw it as an opportunity to rape her. She was scared out of her mind. I felt like doing that,” Murphy had told officers.
“At the time of these offences, he was on bail for a sexual assault. The facts of that are perhaps very chilling because they’re very similar to the facts in this case,” the prosecutor noted, adding that Murphy also has “a number of previous convictions” in the UK including “a youth caution for sexual assault when he was 14”.
The defendant, who declined to have a solicitor represent him, told the court he was “absolutely positive” he had nothing to say in his own defence.
Speaking in support of Murphy was his aunt, Joan Campbell, who alleged he was a “very polite and pleasant” nephew who was “diagnosed with a psychiatric illness” while in Jamaica.
“It has been very difficult because Aaron disappeared. His mum is in America,” she said, adding: “He’s been brought up in a very well home. At one point in Jamaica, he was having private education, so I’m really not sure what’s gone wrong.”
Sentencing, Judge Sarah Munro QC told Murphy that “there is no mental health condition which in any way reduces your culpability for these offences”.
“You told police you smoke cannabis constantly and smoke as much as you can get hold of. It is almost certainly the case that if the police had not arrived when they did you would have succeeded in your aim of killing her as you stated you had one blow left.”
Handing the defendant a life sentence with a minimum tariff of nine years, the judge stressed that Murphy had “committed the offence while on bail for another sexual offence”, and shown “no remorse”.
Detective Sergeant Michael Daly commented: “Murphy is clearly a very dangerous individual, and prison is the only place for him. When describing to officers his sick behaviour, he was callous and uncaring, unbothered by the devastation and ordeal he has just caused.
“The judge recognised the dangerousness of Murphy by sentencing him to life imprisonment and commented that no other sentence would adequately protect the public.”
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