Sex predator Brian Sengendo jailed for life for murdering vulnerable woman

A ‘depraved’ and ‘devil obsessed’ sexual predator who murdered a woman before attacking two more within hours of each other has been jailed at the Old Bailey for life with a minimum term of 42 years. 

Brian Sengendo was seen beating Therasia Gordon, 44, through the door of his white van minutes before he stabbed her to death as ‘sacrifice of an innocent.’

Two days later her body was found in a wooded area in Burntfarm Ride in Enfield, north London.

Hours before the killing on 3 August 2020, Sengendo had filmed himself having sex with a woman and then told her to grab two kitchen knives and join him on a demonic ‘mission’.

Sengendo, of Gilbert Street, Enfield, denied but in January was convicted of murder, attempted murder, rape, two counts of kidnap, one of threatening another with a weapon and making a threat to kill.

Judge John Hillen had earlier praised the ‘excellent police work’ which brought him to justice and: ‘It may well be that a serial killer has been caught on Day One.’

The judge said it was ‘a “Ripper-type” case in which the offender has been caught at the outset.’

Sengendo’s first victim was a sex worker he picked at a BP Garage in Fore Street, Edmonton and took to his flat in Princes Avenue, Muswell Hill, on 2 August 2020.

She said in a statement: ‘We were lying on the bed and Brian started to say lots of weird things.

‘His demeanour would go from being quite light to suddenly aggressive. He was talking about Devils and Demons and how he worshipped the devil….”

Victim: Therasia Gordon, 44, was fatally beaten and stabbed by Sengendo before being dumped in woods in Enfield, north London

He told her he wanted to kill ‘an innocent’ together with her, ‘in the country.’

Sengendo filmed them having sex together on his phone, which was recovered by the police near to where Ms Gordon’s body was found.

As she performed a sex act on him he told the woman: ‘Repeat after me. I’m the devil’s child.’

He then makes her say: ‘I sold my soul to the devil.’

The following day Sengendo called her repeatedly telling her they had to complete the ‘mission.’

The woman said: ‘He told me to bring two kitchen knives. I told him that I didn’t have any knives and I didn’t want to kill anyone.’

But she agreed to meet him and got into the van near the Fore Street garage.

Sengendo pulled out a knife and told her: ‘I’ve got you now, you’re not going anywhere.’

Brian Sengendo’s van. The Old Bailey heard he kidnapped several vulnerable women by ‘tricking’ them into his Vauxhall van where he then attacked them

He added: ‘If you move, I’m gonna f***ing kill you!”.

The woman was so terrified she jumped out of the van while it was moving.

The next victim, who also cannot be named, was repeatedly stabbed and raped after she got into the van in near the Fore Street garage just before midnight.

She said in a statement: ‘All of a sudden the male held a knife to the front of my neck and said something like, ‘This is what’s going to happen.

‘I am going to rape you and I am going to enjoy raping you and you will do what I say or I will kill you”.

‘Then the male kept asking me if I wanted to die. I could feel something pressed to the front of my neck’. She added she then began to perform a sex act on him whilst he was driving.

‘He moved the knife from the front of my neck to my gut,’ she continued in the statement. ‘I could feel the knife pushing against my gut area. The male seemed to enjoy telling me that the knife was there, and he kept asking me if I wanted to die.’

She managed to undo her seatbelt and tried to open the passenger door to jump out.

Prosecutor John Price said: ‘It was then he started stabbing her with his knife. He did so several times.’

The woman suffered seven wounds, two each to her neck, her lower face, her chest and one to her shoulder.

She was later seen staggering into the road by a police officer bleeding heavily from her neck and sobbing: ‘I’ve been stabbed, can someone help me.’

Later that same night local resident Antonis Papasavva called the police after he heard cries of help at the back of his home in Palmers Green an hour later.

Mr Papasavva could see a white van parked in an alley.

‘Standing adjacent to the open front passenger door of the van had been a young black man, who was striking at someone or something inside the van, through the open door,’ Mr Price said.

‘This man had then got back in the driver’s seat after seeing Mr Papasavva at his window and realising he had been seen by him.’

Mr Papasavva called the police but by the time they got to the scene the van had left.

The woman he had seen was Ms Gordon.

Her body was found by a cyclist in Enfield, three days later on the morning of Thursday, August 6.

The partial plate number that Mr Papasavva provided was cross referenced with camera records in the Enfield area.

‘Police records were discovered of this vehicle being twice recently reported as abandoned in Enfield by people who lived there,’ Mr Price said.

On August 4, police recovered Ring.com doorbell CCTV footage from an address in this street, which showed ‘a slim young black male getting into the van and driving it away’. 

Sengendo repeatedly searched for news of the murder and Googled: ‘How long does DNA last on clothes.’

He was arrested in the early hours of 7 August after leaving his home.

Sengendo, of Enfield, denied murder, attempted murder, rape, three counts of kidnap, two of threatening another with a weapon and making a threat to kill.

He claimed he was not the man in the white van.

Jurors were told that less than 30 minutes after the attack on the first victim, Sengendo lured another sex worker into his van.

He refused to give her the money up front and she also jumped out of the van when he pulled out a knife, was claimed. 

Judge Hillen imposed a life sentence with a minimum term of 42 years for Ms Gordon’s murder, telling Sengendo we would not be elligible for parole until 2062. 

The Judge rejected Sengendo’s defence that he was under a drug-induced psychosis when committing the crimes, saying he had ‘never previously set out to excuse your culpability by reference to illness, drugs or drink.’

‘Rather, you set out to shift the blame from yourself. You are a proven liar and manipulator.’

The judge said that Sengendo’s ‘depraved’ intent to kidnap, kill and abuse a sex worker was clear from the outset, ending in Ms Gordon’s death.