David Smith born is an English repeat murderer, rapist and suspected serial killer who came to national prominence in when he was convicted of murdering a sex worker six years after having been acquitted of an "almost identical" [ 2 ] murder. Cleared of the murder of year-old west London sex worker Sarah Crump in , Smith was found guilty in of the killing of year-old Paddington sex worker Amanda Walker.
Smith has since been linked to a number of other murders of sex workers across Britain. In May , Smith was re-tried for the murder of Sarah Crump under ' double jeopardy ' legislation introduced in , and this time was found guilty. Smith was a lorry driver from Hampton, Middlesex now part of Greater London. Smith was also known to frequent woodlands as a voyeur , watching others engaging in sexual acts. At 6 ft tall, 18st and with unusually large size 14 feet, he was nicknamed " Lurch " or "The Honey Monster" by workmates.
Smith was put on trial in for the murder of year-old [ 6 ] sex worker Sarah Crump, who supplemented her income as a psychiatric nurse by working for an escort agency. Later, in , legislation was introduced under the Criminal Justice Act which amended the double jeopardy law, meaning suspects could be retried for a crime that they were previously acquitted of if 'new and compelling' evidence became available. In Smith, who had returned to working as a taxi driver, was sacked by his employer after they discovered his conviction for raping a woman in On 25 April Smith raped , murdered and mutilated year-old sex worker Amanda Walker after picking her up from Sussex Gardens in Paddington in the early hours.
Smith had already been arrested by the time the body was discovered, as police had checked the database of local sex offenders and found that Smith's DNA matched exactly to blood found on Walker's clothing. After his conviction, it was widely reported in the media that Smith had already been acquitted of an "almost identical" and "carbon-copy" murder 6 years previously, with the BBC reporting that Smith "beat" the earlier murder charge.
I said at the trial he would kill again". After his conviction in , police forces across the country examined unsolved murders of sex workers to see if they could have been connected to Smith, and his details were circulated to all UK forces. We believe he was a serial killer and are going back in time to bring closure for victims' families". The rules on double jeopardy were changed in Britain in after the Criminal Justice Act came into force, meaning that cleared suspects could now be tried again for the same crime if new evidence became available.
