Police and prosecution errors left proven sex offender free to murder two women in London

Delays to sexual assault charges and failures to report past convictions in court hearings gave Simon Levy chance to attack more women• Violence against women: has anything changed in policing since Sarah Everard’s killing?Catastrophic errors left a persistent and proven sex offender free before he murdered two women in London, it can be revealed.On Friday, an Old Bailey jury found Simon Levy, 40, guilty of murdering Carmenza Valencia-Trujillo in March 2025 and Sheryl Wilkins five months later.Levy failed to attend three crown court hearings for the train attacks, and the CPS accepts there is no evidence of a warrant being sought for his detention. For two he claimed illness, for the other that he had not been informed. His final non-appearance in crown court was on 11 August 2025. A fortnight later he murdered Wilkins. A CPS source said individuals involved in the Levy case had been disciplined.The assaults on the London tube network and trains were investigated by BTP. Officers arrested Levy, who was travelling on a stolen Oyster travel card, but handed it back to him, unaware it was stolen. With it he travelled to south London to commit his first murder, and carried out further sexual assaults on trains.BTP admitted the charging of Levy for his sexual assaults on trains in November 2024 was held up because of a delay in holding an identification parade after his arrest. His bail was extended, and during this delay he attacked and raped another woman and murdered Valencia-Trujillo. BTP said it had not referred its errors to the police watchdog. Instead it has moved one officer, who it says delayed the holding of the ID parade, out of investigations, and given a supervisor words of advice.BTP identified Levy as a suspect and charged him but never searched his home. Peter Fulton, BTP’s head of crime, said: “There’s a fine line between going fishing and breaching someone’s human rights.” He said that every woman who had reported Levy for attacking them on a train had seen him charged and convicted. When the Met, which investigated the murders, searched Levy’s home, evidence was found about his attack on the prison officer.The police watchdog has placed two Met officers under investigation over whether Levy was supervised correctly as a person on the sex offender register. A constable is under investigation for gross misconduct, meaning he could be dismissed. The other officer, under investigation for misconduct, is a detective sergeant. Continue reading...