![]() “We were all in shock, numb, disbelieving,” she says. In a blur, she broke the news to her own children before flying back to London. Farah Naz was at home in Portugal when she heard. Aleena’s uncle, Kasim Ali, called the rest of the family. When Parveen confirmed it was her, police explained what had happened. The police asked her grandmother, Rashda Parveen, to identify Aleena from a still from the pub’s CCTV. Aleena was a carer for her mother and grandmother, and had a bedroom in each house, walking the half-hour between the two addresses several times a day. She died in hospital at 9.58am on Sunday.Īround 11am, police officers knocked on the door of Aleena’s grandmother, a short distance from Cranbrook Road. Emergency services arrived at about 2.45am, but it was too late to save her. Soon afterwards, Aleena was found by members of the public, who attempted to administer first aid as they waited for an ambulance. The entire brutal assault took nine minutes. ![]() He dragged her into a driveway and sexually assaulted her, before stamping on her several times – with, in the words of the prosecution, “almost unimaginable force” – and leaving her for dead. She always fought for justiceīefore Aleena noticed him, he grabbed her from behind with one arm over her mouth and the other round her neck. As the prosecution lawyer later said: “She did not stand a chance of survival.” If it had been me who was murdered, right now it would be Zara sitting in front of you. Wandering back on to Cranbrook Road, McSweeney spotted Aleena and began to follow her. Fortunately, the woman went into her house before she reached him. When she noticed him, he overtook her, pretending to enter a house but in fact hiding in a driveway, lying in wait. Two men across the road appeared to notice what he was doing, but did not intervene, and the woman went out of their line of vision when she turned off the road with McSweeney close behind her. He followed a third woman along the street. Later, McSweeney went into a chicken shop, staring at a female customer with his hands down his trousers, before following her, too. After leaving the shop, she broke into a desperate run when she saw he was still there. He marched up and down the aisles looking for her, before waiting outside. One woman, noticing he was trailing her, dived into a supermarket to hide. Before encountering Aleena, CCTV footage shows him staggering around the streets of Ilford, following different women. By coincidence, he had also been in the Great Spoon of Ilford earlier in the evening, but was ejected after harassing a female bartender. Aleena was on Cranbrook Road, a well-lit residential street about 10 minutes’ walk from her home, when she crossed paths with a 29-year-old man called Jordan McSweeney, who had recently been released from prison. ![]() Ilford is a bustling, diverse area on the eastern edge of London. “She had this bounce when she walked – it was lovely, so much energy,” she says. When her other aunt, Smaira Naz, imagines her walking that night, she thinks of how Aleena always had a spring in her step. The friend got in a cab, but Aleena walked she was close to home and it was a warm evening. They had dinner and a drink there before moving on to a bar, where Aleena drank water. On the evening of 26 June 2022, Aleena met a friend at a local pub, the Great Spoon of Ilford. Her aunt Farah Naz told her: “Soon, Zara, you are going to be a formidable force.” After passing the solicitors’ exams with distinction and landing this new job, Aleena felt a new stage of her life was beginning. It was an administrative role that took her one step closer to her lifelong dream of being a lawyer something she had pursued doggedly even as her studies were interrupted by caring responsibilities and financial concerns. On her first day, she sent a brightly smiling selfie to her friends and family, saying she couldn’t believe she was actually there. F ive weeks before she was murdered, 35-year-old Zara Aleena started work at the Royal Courts of Justice.
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