Serial Sex Offender Simon Levy Convicted at Old Bailey of Double Murder

A serial sex offender who was ostensibly being monitored by the Metropolitan Police has been convicted at the Old Bailey of murdering two women and raping a third in a case that has exposed severe systemic failings across multiple criminal justice agencies.

Convicted Murderer - Simon Levy

Simon Levy, 40, of Beaufoy Road in Tottenham, was found guilty by a majority verdict on Friday following a five-week trial that detailed a calculated and escalating campaign of violence against vulnerable women in London.

The jury deliberated for 13 hours before convicting him of the murders of 53-year-old Carmenza Valencia-Trujillo and 39-year-old Sheryl Wilkins, as well as two counts of rape, grievous bodily harm with intent and non-fatal suffocation against a surviving third victim.

Judge Mark Lucraft KC presided over the trial where jurors heard that Levy deliberately targeted women who were engaged in street sex work to fund drug addictions.

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The court was told that Levy carried out his first catastrophic attack of 2025 in January, raping and strangling a woman in her thirties in a car park on the High Road in Tottenham.

Despite surviving the ordeal, the woman’s attacker remained at large, and the same location would later become the site of his second murder.

Two months after the January attack, police were called to an abandoned building on the Aylesbury Estate in south-east London where they discovered the body of Ms Valencia-Trujillo on 17 March.

Detectives arrested Levy on suspicion of murder on 1 April after his DNA was found on the victim's body.

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However, because a post-mortem examination was unable to establish a definitive cause of death or confirm third-party involvement, the charge threshold could not be met and Levy was released on bail while further enquiries were conducted.

It was during this period of police bail that Levy struck again. On the morning of 24 August 2025, Ms Wilkins was found unresponsive in the same Tottenham car park where the surviving victim had been attacked months earlier.

Following a second inconclusive post-mortem, investigators utilised facial recognition technology and CCTV footage to place Levy at the scene, leading to his arrest on 5 September.

Crucially, forensic officers discovered a DNA match to Ms Wilkins on a jacket belonging to the defendant, presenting the court with indisputable forensic evidence.

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While in custody, a specialist crime unit identified Levy’s escalating modus operandi, leading to charges for the murder of Ms Wilkins and the January rape being authorised on 7 September, with the murder charge for Ms Valencia-Trujillo following on 19 November.

Throughout the proceedings, Levy declined to give evidence but maintained his pleas of not guilty to all charges.

As the verdicts were delivered to the courtroom, members of the victims' families wept openly in the public gallery. The defendant, wearing sunglasses and sporting a pointed beard, displayed no visible reaction to the decisions.

Following the conclusion of the trial, sweeping reporting restrictions were lifted, allowing the media to disclose Levy’s extensive history of sexual violence and a prior conviction that he accrued whilst on bail for the very murders he has now been convicted of.

In February of this year, Levy was convicted at Inner London Crown Court of 11 counts of indecent assault. The court heard he groped 10 women on crowded London Underground trains between October 2023 and May 2025, and sexually assaulted a female prison officer at HMP Brixton in April 2022.

Levy, who lost sight in one eye following an attack in May 2024, cynically exploited his partial blindness to feign unsteadiness on his feet, claiming his physical contact with women on public transport was accidental.

His established tactic involved tying a jumper around his waist to strap his arm down, allowing him to back into victims with his hand partially covered.

At his sentencing hearing in June, Judge Michael Evans told Levy he was on the Tube for one purpose only, which was to sexually assault women, before handing him an extended sentence comprising a six-year custodial term and a three-year licence period.

The revelation that Levy was able to murder two women and rape a third while already under the scrutiny of the authorities has prompted profound admissions of failure from the Metropolitan Police, the British Transport Police and the Crown Prosecution Service.

The Met confirmed that it believed the death of Ms Wilkins could have been avoided had there not been multiple points of failure in the management of the offender.

Specifically, two Metropolitan Police officers are currently under investigation by the Independent Office for Police Conduct regarding a decision made in August 2024 to downgrade Levy from a high-risk sex offender to medium-risk.

A police constable has been served with a gross misconduct notice and a detective sergeant with a misconduct notice.

The IOPC is examining the entirety of Levy’s management from his first conviction in September 2021 through to his final arrest in September 2025 to determine if policies, procedures and training were adhered to, though the watchdog stressed that the notices do not automatically mean disciplinary proceedings will follow.

The British Transport Police has also confirmed that two of its officers have been moved to alternative roles due to incompetence in their handling of Levy's earlier offences.

Assistant Chief Constable Charlie Doyle admitted that clear opportunities to expedite the investigation were missed and stated that procedures have been amended to ensure repeat offenders and linked offences are prioritised effectively.

Furthermore, Lisa Ramsarran, the chief crown prosecutor for the CPS, issued an apology, acknowledging that the agency's actions fell short of the standards expected by victims, families and the public.

She conceded that a more robust approach should have been taken regarding bail representations based on the available information, noting that while the criminal justice system is operating under significant pressure with busy court lists and late information, this does not lessen the agency's responsibility for the shortcomings.

The systemic failures have drawn sharp criticism from government and charity sectors alike. Crime and Policing Minister Sarah Jones described the fact that Levy was able to inflict such devastating harm after being freed by police and the courts as deeply concerning, demanding urgent answers and the immediate identification of failures so they are never repeated.

Helena Croft, chief executive of the StreetlightUK charity, emphasised that the case demonstrates the critical need to treat women involved in the sex industry as highly vulnerable individuals at risk of serious violence, pointing to missed opportunities regarding information sharing and frontline service engagement.

In the wake of the convictions, the Metropolitan Police detailed significant operational changes, including the deployment of specialist officers across Haringey and Enfield to focus on safety, support and tackling the exploitation of vulnerable street sex workers.

Detective Chief Inspector Neil John, who led the murder investigation, described Levy as a dangerous and predatory offender whose crimes were calculated, cruel and deeply disturbing. He commended the immense bravery of the surviving victim whose testimony proved crucial to the prosecution's case, while reminding the public that lines of enquiry remain open regarding any potential unknown victims.

Judge Mark Lucraft KC remanded Levy into custody following the verdicts. The defendant will return to the Old Bailey to face sentencing on Wednesday 12 August, where he is expected to receive a substantial, if not whole-life, term of imprisonment for his crimes.