Alleged killer Gary Allen searched ‘how to commit perfect murder’, trial hears
MAN ACCUSED OF STRANGLING TWO WOMEN
A MAN accused of strangling two sex workers searched online for “ways to commit the perfect murder,” a court has heard.
Gary Arthur Allen’s “pertinent” phone search came back with a response about the “common traits of serial killers”.
Allen, aged 47, is on trial for the murder of two women carried out 21 years apart.
He allegedly
Samantha Class,
“dumping” her in
Hull in 1997.
He is also accused of throttling Alena Grlakova, 38, in December 2018, leaving her naked body in a drainage culvert in Rotherham.
Between these alleged murders it was claimed he moved to Plymouth where he assaulted two other sex workers – trying to choke one and putting his arm around another’s in a neck from behind, before he was disturbed.
Sheffield Crown Court heard the accused has a “deep-seated” hatred of sex workers and told probation officers he liked to “make them cry” and “enjoyed hurting people”.
Prosecutor Alistair Macdonald said after Alena’s body was found in April 2019, officers searched Allen’s home and found a broken mobile phone.
“An analysis revealed a series of images of dead females in circumstances similar to those in which Alena was found,” Mr Macdonald said.
“A number of highly pertinent web searches had also been found on that telephone.
“A search had been made for ‘ways to commit the perfect murder’ which produced a web response about most common traits of serial killers.
“A search had been made for ‘Murdered female,’ which produced a response about girls attacked when sleeping.”
The body of the first strangled 29, before the River victim,
Samantha Class from Hull, was discovered face down on the banks of the Humber by three schoolgirls in 1997.
A pathologist found she had been beaten, her head stamped on and partly run over by a car, before being left in Hessle near Hull, the court heard.
A jury has been told Allen was previously put on trial for Samantha’s murder in 2000 but found not guilty.
But now the prosecution claim there is “significantly” more evidence against him.
Just weeks after being found not guilty of Samantha’s murder the prosecution say Allen moved to Plymouth where he assaulted two sex workers.
They survived but Allen, of no fixed abode, then moved back to Humberside and allegedly went on to murder mum-of-three Alena.
The prosecutor told how police had missed Alena’s body during their initial searches.
It was not until four months after Alena’s death, that PC Andrew Briscoe found her naked body at the bottom of a steep bank, between some playing fields and an Asda store in Rotherham.
“He walked along the Old Slaugh and he noted that the water level was very low,” Mr Macdonald said.
“It’s distressing, but it’s true, he recognised the smell of decomposing flesh coming from the bottom of the banking and the stream.
“He looked down to see something black and brown stuck up from the silt.
“When he looked more closely, it appeared to be a left leg. It was clear that animals had scavenged some of the flesh.”
Her naked body, the jury heard, had been “weighed down” with “gritty material” so Alena could not have wandered there herself.
“All the evidence tells us that Alena was strangled, that her body was deposited, naked, in the Old Slaugh in a place where detection would be difficult, as proved to be the case,” Mr Macdonald said. “This was no accidental death.” He said this was a “successful effort to hinder the finding of her body and the hope that if it were found, it would be so decomposed that no conclusions could be drawn as to the cause of death.”
He added: “Gary Allen murdered Samantha Class and, having got away with it, within weeks was playing out his fantasies in Plymouth before killing Alena Glrakova. We say he is guilty of each of these offences of murder.”
The trial continues.