A man “decapitated and dismembered” two men and left their heads in a freezer before travelling to the Clifton Suspension Bridge with other parts of their bodies, a court heard.
Yostin Andres Mosquera, 35, is on trial for the murders of Albert Alfonso, 62, and Paul Longworth, 71, on July 8 last year in the flat the two shared in Scotts Road, Shepherd’s Bush, west London.
Mosquera is alleged to have repeatedly stabbed Mr Alfonso, who suffered injuries to his torso, face and neck, while Mr Longworth was attacked with a hammer to the back of his head and his “skull shattered”, Deanna Heer KC, prosecuting, told jurors at Woolwich Crown Court on Tuesday.
Two days later, at about 11.30pm, a cyclist on Clifton Suspension Bridge in Bristol saw the defendant standing next to a “large red suitcase”, and thought he was a tourist so stopped to see if he was ok, and a few metres away from the defendant was a silver trunk, Ms Heer added.
The defendant told the cyclist he was from Colombia and that the suitcases contained car parts.
“That was a lie,” Ms Heer said. “In fact the suitcases contained the decapitated and dismembered bodies of Paul Longworth and Albert Alfonso, which the defendant had taken to Bristol from their home in London where they had been killed two days before.”
Mr Alfonso and Mr Longworth’s decapitated heads were found by police in a chest freezer in their flat, the court heard.
Mosquera has admitted that he killed Mr Alfonso, and Ms Heer added “the killing took place while he and Mr Alfonso were having sex and the sex and the killing were recorded on film”.
Mosquera has admitted the manslaughter of Mr Alfonso, but denies both charges of murder, the jury was told.
The defendant denies that he killed Mr Longworth at all, he blames Mr Alfonso for the killing of Mr Longworth, Ms Heer said.
Ms Heer said: “The prosecution case is that the defendant murdered both men, intending to kill them, and that his actions were planned, they were premeditated, and having killed them, the evidence demonstrates the defendant attempted to steal from them.”
At the time of their deaths, Mr Alfonso and Mr Longworth lived together. Mr Alfonso worked as a swimming instructor at a gym and Mr Longworth was retired, used to work as a handyman and was a regular customer at his local pub, the prosecution said.
Mr Alfonso “liked extreme sex” which he videoed and posted online, she added.
Jurors were told they will hear from a witness called James Smith, which is a pseudonym, who had known Mr Alfonso and Mr Longworth for about 18 years and by the time that they died he “considered them to be close friends”.
He regularly engaged in acts of sexual domination with Mr Alfonso for which he was paid and some of the encounters were posted online, Ms Heer said.
Mr Smith’s description of his early relationship is “undoubtedly troubling”, Ms Heer said, adding Mr Smith “recalls getting drunk with Mr Alfonso only to be told the following morning that they had sex and Mr Alfonso had filmed it”.
She said Mr Alfonso said he would not show anyone else as long as he agreed to do him sexual favours and Mr Smith agreed, then told Mr Alfonso in due course he was not into the sex so Mr Alfonso told him about sexual domination and Mr Smith agreed.
Over time both Mr Alfonso and Mr Longworth became in Mr Smith’s own description “like family to him” and would spend time together doing other things, Ms Heer said.
Mr Longworth had “nothing to do with that side of Albert Alfonso’s life, although he knew about it and, it seems, that he accepted it”, the prosecution said.
Mosquera is a Colombian national who was visiting Mr Alfonso at the time of the killings, and Ms Heer described the defendant as a “pornographic performer”.
James Smith was introduced to the defendant in October 2023 while the defendant was visiting Mr Alfonso and the UK. Mr Alfonso invited Mr Smith to join in one of the sex sessions between him and the defendant and Mr Smith agreed, the court heard.
According to Mr Smith, the defendant “seemed friendly” and told him that “like him, he was also doing it for the money”, the prosecution said.
On July 8 last year, Mr Alfonso worked an early shift at the gym and it was while he was out that the prosecution say the defendant killed Mr Longworth, the court heard.
The defendant brought a laptop with him when he came to the UK which was seized and examined by digital forensic specialists and they found the laptop has a fault in the way that it records time, Ms Heer said.
The defendant allegedly accessed Facebook Marketplace “looking for a freezer” and Google and Youtube searches were also conducted on the laptop in Spanish, which is the defendant’s first language, using search terms such as “where on the head is a knock fatal”, the prosecution said.
Mr Alfonso was killed at about 10.15pm in his own bedroom, the court heard.
The footage shows the defendant ended the sexual encounter by “repeatedly stabbing” Mr Alfonso and “cutting his throat”.
At one point, with Mr Alfonso facing away from him, the defendant “pulls Mr Alfonso’s head back by the chin, with the other hand picks up the knife and “inserts it quite deliberately and quite precisely into Mr Alfonso’s neck”, then Mr Alfonso “begins to struggle, but the defendant, younger, fitter and stronger, managed to overpower him and repeatedly stab him” and at one point asks “do you like it”, Ms Heer said.
Ms Heer said: “What is striking, the prosecution say, when you watch the footage, is just how calm and in control the defendant remains throughout.
“Indeed so unconcerned does he appear by what he’s just done that as Mr Alfonso lies on the floor dead or dying the defendant starts to sing to himself and break into a dance at one point.”
The jury was then shown clips of the video.
The defendant then started using Mr Alfonso’s computer and examination of the computer shows the defendant looking at banking information relating to Mr Alfonso and Mr Longworth before compiling a PowerPoint document of that information, the jury heard.
The defendant tried to send £4,000 to his own account in Colombia, before going to a cashpoint and withdrawing money, Ms Heer said.
Having allegedly killed Mr Alfonso and Mr Longworth, the prosecution said the defendant set about “dismembering them” before “transferring some of their remains to Bristol in an attempt, the prosecution say, to dispose of them at the Clifton Suspension Bridge”.
On July 10 the defendant was driven to Bristol and was on the bridge when bridge staff “noticed something appeared to be leaking from the red suitcase” and the defendant said it was oil, the staff shone their torches on the suitcases and the defendant began to walk away, saying he was going to get the other suitcase, but walked past it then broke into a run, the court heard.
The defendant was arrested on July 13 at about 2.15am after being found sitting on a bench outside Bristol Temple Meads railway station, the jury was told.
The defendant’s case in relation to Mr Alfonso is he “lost his self-control” in a way that “reduces his responsibility from murder to a lesser offence of manslaughter”.
The trial continues.
