There have been more homicides in Southwark than anywhere else in London over the past five years, according to police data.
Some 41 homicides were recorded in Southwark between June 2017 and May 2022, above Newham in east London with 40, Greenwich with 38, Lambeth with 34 and Croydon with 33.
In English law, homicide includes murder and manslaughter. The most recent homicides were in April 2022, when four family members were killed at home on a Bermondsey estate. Joshua Jacques was charged with the murder of Dolet Hill, Denton Burke, Tanysha Ofori-Akuffo and Samantha Drummonds on the Bonamy Estate.
Other than that, the homicide rate has rarely risen above one or two per month in Southwark over the past five years, although these numbers do not convey the horror and grief each homicide leaves behind. Here we look back at some of the tragic killings that have shocked the people of our borough.
Breaking News: Kenneth Umezie found not guilty of Sidique Kamara murder
Abdirahman Mohamed, 2017
Camberwell boy Abdirahman Mohamed, 17, was found with a stab wound to the chest on June 2, 2017 on Southampton Way in Peckham. He died within minutes.
Sidique Kamara, 21, was tried for his murder but found not guilty.
Two years and two months later, Kamara himself, a member of Walworth drill group and alleged gang Moscow17, was stabbed to death on Warham Street in Camberwell.
Kenneth Umezie, 32 and from Camberwell, was found not guilty of Kamara’s murder and manslaughter at the Old Bailey, although he admitted that a knife he was carrying could have dealt the fatal blow.
Rhyhiem Barton: renewed appeal to find killer of boy gunned down in Kennington
Rhyhiem Barton, 2018
Rhyhiem Barton was shot on the corner of Camberwell New Road and John Ruskin Street in Kennington on May 5, 2018 while out with friends.
Two people were arrested on suspicion of murdering the seventeen-year-old aspiring rapper from the Brandon Estate in June 2018 – but no one has been charged more than four years on from the killing, despite a £20,000 police reward.
He had already survived a near-miss stabbing attack and had been sent to Jamaica, where his family originally came from, in an attempt to keep him safe. But he came back to London after ten months to pursue his musical goals.
A BBC documentary, Murder on the Streets, asked what more could have been done to help Rhyhiem, who had attended five schools by the age of fifteen.
His mentor Sayce Holmes-Lewis said: ““When a school or organisation decides to exclude permanently an eight-year-old young, black male, you are setting him up to fail.
“The stereotypical journey, it is a school to prison pipeline – or a school to death pipeline.”
Man found guilty of chasing and stabbing teen to death in ‘merciless’ Elephant and Castle attack
McCaulay Junior Urugbezi-Edwards, 2019
McCaulay Junior Urugbezi-Edwards, 18, was “remorselessly” chased through an Elephant and Castle estate and stabbed to death on May 5, 2019.
McCaulay met Rashai Annang, from Lewisham at the Tube station that day by chance. They had a brief conversation before McCaulay ran away, pursued by Annang on a bike from Gaol Park into Tiverton Street, near the Rockingham Estate.
Annang found McCaulay on the ground, kicked him and stabbed him forcefully several times. Annang fled the scene and McCaulay died a few hours later.
Police found Annang in a Norwich hotel. He was found guilty of McCaulay’s murder in September 2020, and showed “no remorse” for his actions. He was sentenced to sixteen years and 265 days in prison.
Man jailed for manslaughter after killing man in altercation outside Old Kent Road bar
Santiago Lenin Borja Denoso, 2020
Santiago Lenin Borja Denoso, 45, died after hitting his head when he was pushed to the ground outside a restaurant on the Old Kent Road on February 23, 2020.
He died more than a month later, on March 31, 2020. Jose Adolfo Licona Valladares, 25, of Brixton Hill, was jailed in October for three years after pleading guilty to manslaughter.
Beatrice Cenusa: East Dulwich man jailed for life for ‘vicious’ murder of ex-wife
Beatrice Cenusa, 2021
Beatrice Cenusa, 26, was stabbed to death by her ex-husband Stony Stoica, 44, in a “vicious” attack at her flat on Lordship Lane in East Dulwich on July 23, 2021.
Stoica attacked his wife just a few feet away from their nine-year-old daughter. Ms Cenusa was found with the knife still embedded in her chest. She was rushed to hospital but died a few hours later.
Stoica turned himself in at a Peckham police station a few hours later and admitted he had just killed his ex-wife. He was jailed for life in February this year, and will serve a minimum of eighteen years in prison.