00:00:04
[SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] NARRATOR: In June 2016, police in Luxembourg swooped on a hostel for asylum seekers.
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The officers were executing an international search warrant for a man who was wanted for the murder of a retired couple
00:00:23
in Suffolk, England. GEOFFREY WANSELL: To say that Peter Stuart was killed is an understatement.
00:00:29
He was stabbed nine times, seven times in the back, twice in the front. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: Sylvia's body has never been found,
00:00:38
and this suggests to me that the killer doesn't want Sylvia's body to be found, because Sylvia's body will tell part
00:00:45
of the story about her murder. NARRATOR: Investigators were certain they had tracked down
00:00:51
their man, former carer Ali Qazimaj who'd been on the run for almost two weeks.
00:00:57
But the 43-year-old suspect insisted he was someone entirely different. KARIM KHALIL QC: He claimed throughout the case
00:01:05
that his true identity and only identity was that of Vital Dapi, and he had nothing to do with either of the other names or identities.
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NARRATOR: Despite his protestations, Qazimaj was extradited to Britain to face trial.
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It would be up to prosecutors to prove that he was a cold-blooded murderer. ANTHONY CARROLL: Qazimaj was an evil, calculating killer who
00:01:28
lived in a fantasy world and was prepared to murder people for his own gains. NARRATOR: Ali Qazimaj had been unveiled as one of the world's
00:01:37
most evil killers. [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] In March 2017, 44-year-old Ali Qazimaj was found guilty of the double murder
00:02:09
of Peter and Sylvia Stuart. The retired couple disappeared from their home in Weybread Suffolk on the 3rd of June, 2016.
00:02:20
Peter's body was discovered hours later, while Sylvia's remains have never been found.
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The murders shook the small community to the core. ZACH WARD: At the time, I was the senior reporter
00:02:34
at the Diss Express. Diss Express is a weekly newspaper covering local stories, about 400 square miles
00:02:41
across Norfolk and Suffolk. And most the stories we covered were very small fry, to be frank.
00:02:47
You know, it was planning permission, it was really small things. Sticking up for local people basically.
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So something like this was quite shocking. NARRATOR: Fellow reporter Anthony Carroll also
00:02:57
covered the harrowing story. Obviously, as a journalist, you do get to cover murders and major events.
00:03:04
So I had covered a few. But to cover one in a village like this, a double murder,
00:03:08
with all the strange circumstances around it, was a major story for me and one of the most compelling
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I've ever covered as a journalist in my 15 years of reporting. NARRATOR: Reading on with interest
00:03:23
was barrister Karim Khalil QC, who would eventually go toe to toe with Ali Qazimaj at Ipswich Crown Court.
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KARIM KHALIL QC: He's cold. Because of his behavior in the witness box, he demonstrated an ability to withstand really very close
00:03:40
questioning over a significant period of time, with evidence presented to him, which
00:03:46
to any independent observer, would be regarded as overwhelming. And yet he simply stood in the face of that
00:03:53
and continued his denials in a calm manner. NARRATOR: This killer's story begins in southeastern Europe.
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Ali Qazimaj was born Vital Dapi in Elbasan, Albania in 1973. His upbringing is an enigma.
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ELIZABETH YARDLEY: We don't know very much about his background. We know that he came from a relatively traditional family.
00:04:22
His dad worked as a plumber, and he had a sibling. But aside from that, it is a bit of a mystery.
00:04:28
NARRATOR: It's believed that Vital Dapi served in the Albanian Special Forces.
00:04:34
But around the age of 27, he arrived on the shores of Britain, claiming to be from Kosovo, in the then
00:04:41
war-torn Balkan Peninsula. GEOFFREY WANSELL: He was essentially an asylum seeker.
00:04:47
And when he presented himself in this country formally, he changed from being Vital Dapi to Ali Qazimaj. He
00:04:57
became a different character. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: So here is somebody who is quite comfortable with trying on different identities.
00:05:05
He is an actor. He will fit into the parts that he's made up for himself. ANDY BAKER: He worked in a number of jobs, sometimes two
00:05:13
or three jobs at the same time. Part-time driver, general worker, and some other part-time work as well,
00:05:20
fairly mundane blue-collar kind of jobs. GEOFFREY WANSELL: He was partly Ali Qazimaj in Britain,
00:05:27
doing a variety of jobs, but he was regularly going back to Albania as Vital Dapi to resume parts of his life there.
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He had, for example, a wife and a child in Albania. It was literally Walter Mitty, two lives.
00:05:45
Now, what he did in his periods in Albania remain something of a mystery. NARRATOR: By 2005, Qazimaj was working as a carer
00:06:01
in the town of Grays in Essex. He'd become a British citizen, thanks largely to the woman
00:06:07
he was looking after, Helen Paxman. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: Helen was somebody who provided a reference for him on his citizenship application.
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She was somebody who bought him clothes. She bought him a car. Yes, she really did believe that this man genuinely
00:06:21
had affection for her. So this tells me that he's very good at performing emotions,
00:06:26
even though he doesn't feel them. He knows exactly what people need to hear to get what he wants from them.
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NARRATOR: During his time as her carer, Qazimaj got to know Helen Paxman and her husband Sidney
00:06:40
very well. Helen, I'm sad to say, dies. But the relationship doesn't break down,
00:06:47
because her husband Sidney has a problem, has a hip operation. He now needs a carer, and who better
00:06:56
than Ali, who has been looking after Helen for all those years? NARRATOR: But all was not as it seemed.
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Qazimaj was arrested three times for various offenses during his time in the UK.
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And he'd started talking to Sidney Paxman about his mysterious private life.
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KARIM KHALIL QC: He had told Mr. Paxman whilst taking him out for walks, for example, and caring for him,
00:07:21
that he was a trained killer, or in Serbia, he had carried out a contract killing.
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That was a rather curious conversation to have for a man who had no such interest in these matters.
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ELIZABETH YARDLEY: So he claims that he killed a man for money, and he describes in detail what happened during this incident.
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And I think this tells us a lot about him, in terms of how he wants to be seen by other people.
00:07:46
He's somebody who builds relationships on other people's fear of him. He's not interested in mutuality or respect or understanding.
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Here is somebody who values violence, and that's something that's at the forefront.
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NARRATOR: Qazimaj had also developed an expensive gambling habit, something for which he devised
00:08:09
an entirely new persona. GEOFFREY WANSELL: But now, yet again, the man who has been two people becomes three people.
00:08:17
As far as the gambling is concerned, he's called Marco Costa. He's not called Vital Dapi.
00:08:23
He's not called Ali Qazimaj. He's called Marco Costa, a man used to living a double life is
00:08:29
now leading a triple life. But unfortunately, he isn't earning enough money to support his increasingly elaborate and addicted gambling
00:08:39
habit. But nevertheless, on the surface, to all intents and purposes, he's admirable character.
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I think at one point, he starts calling Sidney Paxman dad. NARRATOR: Qazimaj's seemingly caring nature
00:08:53
helped him con the Paxman family out of a significant amount of money, which he used to fuel his gambling addiction.
00:09:02
So he's appearing to be somebody who is quite selfless and empathetic. He's engaged in this caring occupation.
00:09:09
And this is the view that people will have of him. But when you look behind the scenes, what was actually going
00:09:14
on during the time he was working for the Paxman's, he actually took 10,000 pounds from them during this period.
00:09:21
So this is a man who uses charm, who uses manipulation, who sets up relationships with people that they feel are genuine,
00:09:29
but they're anything but. NARRATOR: By the summer of 2016, Qazimaj was still caring for Sidney Paxman in Grays Essex.
00:09:42
But in June, 75 miles away in the Suffolk village of Weybread, journalists were just
00:09:48
learning about the disappearance of a local couple. ZACH WARD: So it was on the Friday
00:09:53
where we received a missing persons appeal from Suffolk Police, and we would get missing persons appeal quite regularly.
00:10:01
But I think, obviously, where there was two people missing in this case, meant it was probably a little bit
00:10:04
out of the ordinary typically. ANTHONY CARROLL: I was in the office somewhere on a Friday,
00:10:09
just covering the patch, and you get a police statement sent out saying I'm looking for a missing couple
00:10:14
in the Village of Weybread. So you sometimes think, oh, I wonder what that's about.
00:10:19
Soon, it became obvious that this was a more serious case of a missing people case with the amount
00:10:22
of police presence. By the afternoon, we were getting the steer, you know, this might be quite a major story.
00:10:29
NARRATOR: Peter and Sylvia Stuart had retired to Weybread 10 years previously. By the 3rd of June, 2016, they hadn't been seen for five days.
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GEOFFREY WANSELL: They were last seen at just about a quarter past 10 in the morning of the 29th of May, 2016,
00:10:49
in a farm shop in Norfolk. It was the last official sighting of them. KARIM KHALIL QC: They appeared entirely normal.
00:10:58
There was nothing untoward about their behavior to alert anybody that there potentially was anything wrong.
00:11:04
And then it was the following Tuesday that they failed to attend their line dancing class.
00:11:10
And that's when the alarm was first raised. NARRATOR: The Stuart's daughter, Christy, became immediately
00:11:16
concerned about her parents. She contacted a friend, a neighbor, who knew the Stuarts.
00:11:23
And indeed said, would you mind just going and checking on mom and dad. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: And when this friend arrived at the house,
00:11:29
it was almost as if they'd vanished into thin air. There was a computer with an eBay page open.
00:11:35
The cat litter tray hadn't been changed for a while. There was only a tiny amount of water in the cat's bowl.
00:11:41
It was as if they just got up and walked out. NARRATOR: The police were called to investigate.
00:11:48
The small village of Weybread had just one question on their lips-- what had happened to Peter and Sylvia Stuart?
00:11:56
Concerns for the couple were growing. [SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC] ANDY BAKER: So when the police went to the house
00:12:08
on the 3rd of June, it was easy to get in. There was a key there. But there was no sign of disturbance, no blood present.
00:12:15
They're just missing, vanished. KARIM KHALIL QC: They found really nothing out of place at all.
00:12:21
There was no indication of forced entry or anything of that sort. It appeared forensically very clean.
00:12:27
What they did find there was what was a suggestion of a partially finished meal.
00:12:33
And then they examined the computer that was on one of the tables. And it appeared that Sylvia had been
00:12:39
shopping on eBay for, I think, some shoes for her husband. But this hadn't been completed.
00:12:45
So the last use of that laptop was at about 2:45 in the afternoon. And after that, there was no trace
00:12:51
of either of the existence of Peter or Sylvia. ANDY BAKER: They would have searched thoroughly the house,
00:12:57
not just for Peter and Sylvia's presence, but anything that may give them a clue where they are.
00:13:03
If they had mobile phones, did they leave them behind? Was there money there? Had their car gone?
00:13:07
Were the keys there? There's many opportunities that will take you through an avenue
00:13:12
of the investigation. And they would have looked at every single element of opportunity to try and find Peter and Sylvia.
00:13:19
That wasn't there. NARRATOR: Local journalist, Anthony Carroll, arrived in the village to find out more
00:13:28
about the developing story. ANTHONY CARROLL: I remember getting into Weybread. It was so remote.
00:13:33
It was off the beaten track, away from the main village. So you drive down this road for a while,
00:13:37
then you come across a few houses. And then just sort of heavy police presence. Then you realize, oh, something major is happening here.
00:13:44
It's all cordoned off. Always a bit of shock seeing what's happened in middle of this rural location
00:13:49
in the middle of nowhere? You know, just a strange mystery going on. Want to try and get to the bottom of it.
00:13:55
NARRATOR: Anthony began to interview the worried locals. ANTHONY CARROLL: So we went out there, got a feel of the place,
00:14:01
spoke to neighbors. We were writing the story up saying, police search for missing couple.
00:14:07
GEOFFREY WANSELL: Later that day, in the early evening of Friday the 3rd of June, Peter Stuart's
00:14:12
body is discovered in a flooded ditch in grounds behind their garden. There's no sign whatever of his wife, Sylvia.
00:14:26
ANTHONY CARROLL: So by the end of Friday, there was a murder investigation we were reporting on.
00:14:30
I think the initial reaction in the local area was shock. This sort of thing never happens in this rural part
00:14:37
of the world. And we're not used to having national TV stations and the national media descend
00:14:42
on a tiny little village. I had been at the newspaper by that point for the best
00:14:47
part of three years. And we hadn't covered anything like this before, because without sounding too cliche,
00:14:51
nothing like this ever did happen in Suffolk. NARRATOR: It's believed that 75-year-old Peter Stuart had
00:15:01
been murdered whilst preparing lunch on the 30th of May, four days before the discovery of his body.
00:15:09
Peter's body was found about 50 foot from the couple's house. He'd been repeatedly stabbed to death.
00:15:14
He'd been stabbed nine times. Eight of those stab wounds would have proved fatal, as shown
00:15:20
by the post-mortem examination. GEOFFREY WANSELL: And as the pathologist was to say later,
00:15:25
huge force was used. He wasn't simply killed. He was butchered. ZACH WARD: Nothing can actually really
00:15:32
prepare you for having to report on something like this. And you know, we're sort of several degrees away from it.
00:15:37
It's nothing compared to what the actual family are going through, but it was shocking.
00:15:42
NARRATOR: Peter's body had been found lying in the woodland just behind the couple's home.
00:15:48
The killer made little effort to hide the crime. He had been wrapped in a tarpaulin.
00:15:54
And he'd been deposited, left abandoned, dumped in a ditch. ZACH WARD: I believe the officer who
00:16:01
found Mr. Stuart had said that he could see a hand from under the tarpaulin. So it hadn't been done particularly well.
00:16:09
So this method of disposal is quite haphazard. This is a killer who just wants the body out of the way.
00:16:16
Obviously, it's going to be discovered very quickly. So this is incredibly revealing to me about the killer,
00:16:23
because this shows me that at this point in time, he's got more important things to worry about.
00:16:28
He's preoccupied with something else. NARRATOR: Peter's 69-year-old wife, Sylvia,
00:16:37
was nowhere to be found. Suffolk Police immediately upped the urgency in the hunt for her and her husband's killer.
00:16:46
ANDY BAKER: They knew they had a murder inquiry straightaway. It's not only person, but then they must conduct an open mind
00:16:53
as to what happened to Sylvia. Has she been murdered? Is she harmed? Is she being held against her will or she willingly
00:16:59
participating with someone who's committed the murder or not? ANTHONY CARROLL: The circumstances around this case
00:17:04
were, of course, very mysterious and strange and almost like a crime novel. There was a rural location, very remote, a couple living
00:17:12
on their own, seemed very quiet and kept themselves to themselves. That's the big mystery, of course, to the whole case.
00:17:18
What happened to her? Was she still alive? Obviously, you foster with the community with what's happened
00:17:24
and you want to make sure you write the story correctly. So get the facts right.
00:17:30
And obviously, you start thinking, I wonder what's happened to his wife. You know, where's Sylvia?
00:17:37
NARRATOR: The news of a murder and a missing person spread fear amongst the small village of Weybread,
00:17:44
where the Stuarts were known to be a popular couple. ANTHONY CARROLL: Obviously, in the local community,
00:17:49
there was a sense of concern, fear, and worry. People worried what had happened to the Stuarts.
00:17:54
People were worried, was the killer still in their community? Was it safe to go out?
00:17:59
I think most people were worried about when it was Sylvia hadn't been seen, what had happened to her.
00:18:03
So people were very concerned that she'd be found safe and well. Obviously, talking to people in the village,
00:18:09
it was just a mixture of concern and worry about what had happened in their tranquil community.
00:18:14
GEOFFREY WANSELL: Well, there can be no doubt that the inhabitants of Weybread in Suffolk
00:18:18
would have been horrified at the discovery of a local resident who goes line dancing with his wife literally every week
00:18:25
and is popular in the local community would have horrified the residents. ANDY BAKER: Other people would have been in fear, in fear what
00:18:33
brings murder to our doorstep. What brings murder to these people have lived a very safe, lawful life
00:18:40
and they are robbed of life in this way? NARRATOR: The first suspects on the investigators' radar
00:18:51
were the Stuart's other family members. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: Very often, when there is a murder,
00:18:56
it will be somebody that's close to us. It will be somebody in our family. It will be one of our friends.
00:19:01
So the police have to rule all of those people out before they can rule out other people in.
00:19:07
NARRATOR: Less than 48 hours after the discovery of Peter's body, detectives over 100 miles away from Weybread
00:19:15
brought a man in for questioning. All we were told was a 61-year-old from Leicester had been arrested.
00:19:21
And at the time, we didn't do, to be honest, a huge amount of digging because it
00:19:26
was an incredibly fast-moving investigation, but also sensitivity is needed. And at the time, the last thing we wanted to do
00:19:32
was try to impede or get the wrong bit of information out there. But within a day or so, the local media around the area
00:19:39
had found out that it was actually the son-in-law of the Stuarts. GEOFFREY WANSELL: Steve Paxman explains that he's always
00:19:46
had a complicated relationship with Peter, his father-in-law, but it's always been amicable.
00:19:51
There's never been any disagreement. But Steve also points out that someone who knew him
00:19:57
was also his father's carer. The police talk to his father, Sidney, who gives them for the first time
00:20:05
the name of Ali Qazimaj as his carer and someone who's talked to him about the terrible things
00:20:12
he's done in the past. He's bragged about murdering people. NARRATOR: Steve Paxman was immediately
00:20:20
released from custody. The police were now on the hunt for a man who lived in Tilbury, Essex, 43-year-old carer Ali Qazimaj.
00:20:32
ZACH WARD: When we first heard the name Ali Qazimaj, we didn't really know too much about him.
00:20:37
We knew that he was from Kosovo. That was information we received from the police.
00:20:42
And apart from that, we didn't know too much, apart from he was the main suspect.
00:20:46
ANTHONY CARROLL: I think the police looking into his background soon had very strong concerns that he was linked to his disappearance.
00:20:52
And so his name and image began to get circulated. Obviously, we didn't know much about him at all.
00:20:58
We knew he had a link to Tilbury in Essex and that he had a connection to the Stuart family.
00:21:03
NARRATOR: Qazimaj had been working as a carer for Peter Stuart's son-in-law's
00:21:08
father, Sidney Paxman, for the previous decade. Sidney told detectives that during a conversation
00:21:15
with his carer on the 3rd of June, Qazimaj had told him that he'd done something bad.
00:21:22
Ali Qazimaj was now the prime suspect in Peter's murder. The Stuarts and the Paxman's were
00:21:29
in-laws by marriage through the respective children. And it was Sidney Paxman's suspicions
00:21:35
of what Qazimaj had said to him that led him to say, it's not my son. You need to look at this chap, which is what they did.
00:21:43
Say there is a link between Qazimaj and the victim, but I think Qazimaj thought that the police would
00:21:49
never put this all together. He thought he was far too clever. NARRATOR: Investigators were certain they
00:21:56
had identified Peter's killer. Now, they just needed to track him down, but Ali Qazimaj, the carer turned killer,
00:22:06
was nowhere to be seen. KARIM KHALIL QC: They found his workplace, and it became apparent that Ali Qazimaj had
00:22:16
left his workplace abruptly. They spoke to many of his colleagues, who detailed curious conversations with him,
00:22:24
in which he had spoken of planning a robbery and that sort of thing. They examined the computer to which he had access at work.
00:22:33
And it was discovered that that computer had been used to search for the home address of the Stuart family
00:22:40
on one of the many evaluation sites that are out there. And so it seemed as if he had an unusual and unexplained
00:22:48
interest in the home of Peter and Sylvia Stuart. He was definitely planning something.
00:22:54
He wanted to make sure that he had this down to a T. It's quite likely, I think as well,
00:23:00
that he stalked this couple, because he wanted to leave nothing to chance. NARRATOR: Detectives soon uncovered further evidence
00:23:09
to link Qazimaj to the Stuarts. KARIM KHALIL QC: And so the inquiries continued, of course.
00:23:14
His mobile phone was tracked and eventually through cell site analysis, it was discovered, along with his motor car,
00:23:22
a Citroen vehicle, that he had made some six trips, each of which was unexplained, from the area
00:23:29
or locality of his home or work address in London, up to Weybread. And there was no known reason why he would have an interest
00:23:38
in going there, other than as some sort of reconnaissance trips. And I think six previous trips and then
00:23:46
the final trip, of course, was logged by similar forensic analysis on the day of the killings itself.
00:23:55
NARRATOR: 69-year-old Sylvia Stuart remained missing. She had last been seen with her husband
00:24:02
on a local farm shop CCTV on the 29th of May. But suspicious activity surrounding Sylvia's bank
00:24:10
account after she'd vanished led investigators to fear the worst. And the day after, so it would have been the 30th of May,
00:24:19
in Thurrock, someone took money out. And it was from Sylvia Stuart's account.
00:24:25
Creature of habit. Didn't go to Thurrock in the middle of the night, didn't take any money in the middle of the night.
00:24:30
So that was suspicious. The same card was used to try and take out money again. They also later, 300 pounds was taken out,
00:24:38
and then another attempt at 500 pound but obviously limited up and had been stopped.
00:24:44
And this was obviously Qazimaj. Now, Sylvia's clearly given her PIN number to Qazimaj so that he withdraws the money, because when
00:24:53
the police discover that her bank card has been used in an ATM, they naturally look at the CCTV, which
00:25:02
is above every ATM machine. And no sign of Sylvia in any of those CCTV images. NARRATOR: Detectives got their biggest
00:25:15
break yet when Ali Qazimaj's car was found abandoned in Dover. But evidence within the vehicle also
00:25:23
confirmed their worst fears. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: When Qazimaj's car was discovered,
00:25:28
there were traces of blood on the outside of the driver's door. And this blood matched Peter's DNA profile.
00:25:36
In the boot, they found some human hairs. And they matched Sylvia's profile.
00:25:41
They also found in the car a carrier bag in the passenger foot well, which had Qazimaj's fingerprints on it.
00:25:47
And Qazimaj's fingerprints were also found on the driver's door. So it was a no doubt that this was Qazimaj's car,
00:25:53
and it was a direct link to the victims. KARIM KHALIL QC: And so it became apparent
00:25:57
that somehow Sylvia likely had been placed into that boot of that car and taken somewhere.
00:26:03
We don't know where, but he d deposited her body. NARRATOR: Back in Weybread, the news
00:26:15
that Ali Qazimaj was the prime suspect in the now double-murder case brought a sense of consolation
00:26:22
to the village. ANTHONY CARROLL: When Qazimaj's name was released, I suppose some people were relieved,
00:26:27
as people had been worried that the killer might still be in the community. So people were probably relieved that police
00:26:33
suspected who the killer was and were hunting for him. NARRATOR: Ali Qazimaj had taken the lives
00:26:39
of Peter and Sylvia Stuart for nothing more than his own financial gain. The 43-year-old, who was a carer for the couple's relative,
00:26:48
Sidney Paxman, had learned about the Stuarts in conversation with him. Qazimaj believed that the Stuarts
00:26:55
were millionaires, because that's what Sidney Paxman had told him. And I think his eyes probably lit up at this point
00:27:02
in time, because Sidney also said that they didn't have a very good relationship
00:27:06
with their son-in-law. So not only have you got this potential reward of lots of money to go after, but you've got
00:27:12
another suspect who's going to distract the police from you. So I think Qazimaj thought he really was onto something here.
00:27:19
They represented for Ali Qazimaj a natural target. Now, did he set out originally to kill them
00:27:28
or did he simply set out to extort them, demand money from them? Qazimaj was quite good at persuading
00:27:37
people to give him money. Sidney Paxman, for example, had given him about 10,000 pounds during the period in which
00:27:43
he was looking after him. He was used to getting money out of elderly people, and he could be at one moment affable
00:27:50
but at the moment frightening. NARRATOR: Investigators discovered CCTV footage from the 4th of June, the day after the discovery of Peter
00:28:03
Stuart's body, showing Qazimaj boarding a ferry at the Port of Dover. ANTHONY CARROLL: Qazimaj had fled to Europe,
00:28:10
and some people believe that with his connections he might disappear forever. So a lot of people were thinking he'd never be found
00:28:16
and be brought back to justice. But the police believed they would find him and carried on with their search.
00:28:22
NARRATOR: Detectives released pictures of Ali Qazimaj across Europe in a desperate attempt
00:28:27
to find the double killer. The supposed former special forces soldier come hit man could have been anywhere on the continent.
00:28:36
ELIZABETH YARDLEY: Qazimaj was on the run for around two weeks. And this is really interesting for me,
00:28:41
because for somebody who claims to have been a professional hitman, these people are very used to going
00:28:46
to ground, disappearing. So I think that really does invalidate those claims that he made.
00:28:52
He would have been much better at going off the radar if that was really the case.
00:28:57
And he was spotted by a hostel worker in Luxembourg, who had seen a picture of him on the internet.
00:29:03
So police caught up with him incredibly quickly. He wasn't the underworld figure that he'd like to think he was.
00:29:11
NARRATOR: Qazimaj had been hiding out at a hostel for asylum seekers. On the 16th of June, 2016, just over two weeks
00:29:20
since the murders of Peter and Sylvia Stuart, he was arrested by local police in Luxembourg.
00:29:26
ANTHONY CARROLL: In an incredible coincidence and sort of stroke of luck for the police,
00:29:30
this person had put two and two together, else he might have escaped justice forever.
00:29:41
NARRATOR: Although detectives were confident they had captured their man, Qazimaj used a different alias when
00:29:48
speaking with the authorities. GEOFFREY WANSELL: When he's first interrogated,
00:29:52
he's interrogated as Vital Dapi and insists he doesn't know who Ali Qazimaj is.
00:29:58
And indeed, not only does he not know who he is, he's never even been to England.
00:30:02
He's still an asylum seeker in Europe. It is, of course, a complete tissue of lies.
00:30:10
NARRATOR: British investigators had Qazimaj's fingerprints from when he first
00:30:15
claimed asylum in the country. So the 43-year-old's assertions that he was a different person, Vital Dapi, were easily disproved.
00:30:24
Those fingerprints are the same fingerprints as the person that turned up in the UK in 1999,
00:30:30
had his fingerprints taken. They matched. The forensic evidence in the Citroen driven, owned,
00:30:37
and abandoned by Qazimaj soon after he murdered the Stuarts, the fingerprint expert 16 times identified fingerprints that
00:30:48
tied that person as the same as the person who claimed that he was Qazimaj from Kosovo and the fingerprints taken
00:30:55
in Luxembourg were the person now detained. NARRATOR: Qazimaj and Dapi had another similarity, which
00:31:02
had been recorded when the carer was previously arrested years before in the UK.
00:31:09
KARIM KHALIL QC: When he was in Luxembourg, it was noted that he had a particular tattoo
00:31:14
on the upper part of one of his arms. It was of an eagle clutching a heart, I think.
00:31:20
And historically, on an old custody record, there was a note of this identical tattoo being
00:31:27
on the upper arm on the same side of a man bearing one of the other alias names.
00:31:32
And so the chances of such a coincidence happening were thought to be vanishingly small.
00:31:41
NARRATOR: On July the 4th, 2016, Ali Qazimaj was extradited back to the UK. Despite the overwhelming forensic evidence
00:31:51
that disproved his claim, he continued to refer to himself as an innocent Albanian
00:31:57
asylum seeker named Vital Dapi. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: He claims he's never been to the UK,
00:32:03
yet when he's talking to police, he's using English slang words. He's talking colloquially.
00:32:09
And this is the kind of language that you don't get from watching English TV series on the internet.
00:32:14
You have to be in the UK, living life in the UK to know what some of these phrases mean.
00:32:19
So there were lots of alarm bells there for police. KARIM KHALIL QC: Upon arrival, he
00:32:24
reverted to pretending that he didn't speak good English. He denied that he had the identity which
00:32:30
is being ascribed to him, claiming that he had at all times been elsewhere. And so he ran the defense of mistaken identity.
00:32:41
NARRATOR: On the 22nd of July, Qazimaj was charged with two counts of murder. But the 43-year-old was sticking to his story.
00:32:50
It would be up to prosecutor Karim Khalil QC to prove that the carer turned killer had murdered
00:32:57
the Stuarts for their money. KARIM KHALIL QC: He was an extreme gambler. He had become more and more in debt as the time
00:33:08
of these killings approached. And he was unable to meet those debts. So it appeared reasonably clear to the prosecution
00:33:16
that the motive for these killings was actually straightforward financial greed.
00:33:22
He needed to find a way to cover his debts and/or set up a new life somewhere else.
00:33:28
And so he targeted these people as ones whom he believed had access to ready finances.
00:33:35
And he could simply go and secure it from them. They'd be too vulnerable to resist.
00:33:40
ELIZABETH YARDLEY: I don't think that the murder of Peter and Sylvia was in any way a way of getting money to pay
00:33:46
off those gambling debts. I think that this was a way of going after a really big reward for himself.
00:33:52
And when you are gambling, there's quite a lot of uncertainty as to whether you're
00:33:56
going to be successful. But in this case, Qazimaj thought this was [INAUDIBLE]..
00:34:01
He really thought he'd set himself up for life, I think. NARRATOR: Despite the damning forensic evidence against him,
00:34:14
Qazimaj claimed total innocence, asserting that he was a completely different person.
00:34:21
ZACH WARD: Ali Qazimaj went by three aliases-- Ali Qazimaj, Marco Costa, and Vital Dapi.
00:34:27
And that was his defense, that they had the wrong person, that he'd never been to England, and they made a mistake
00:34:32
and that he would never hurt a fly, let alone murder two people. KARIM KHALIL QC: The principle challenge of the case
00:34:37
was to prove that these three identities all related to the same one person and that that one
00:34:44
person was the man in the dock named by the Crown as Ali Qazimaj. NARRATOR: Part of Qazimaj's defense
00:34:51
was to prove beyond doubt that he was Vital Dapi. But the evidence he produced seemed to make
00:34:58
him look even more guilty. KARIM KHALIL QC: In fact, some of these documents were actually provided by Al Qazimaj
00:35:04
during the trial in support of his defense. But they ultimately backfired, because by way of example,
00:35:10
a photograph of his identity in Albania under one name, we could demonstrate was the identical photograph which
00:35:17
he had used on his UK passport under an entirely different name. And so when one put all the pieces of that jigsaw together,
00:35:26
his fingerprints, each of these items was brought together under the different identities,
00:35:32
and demonstrated all to relate to the same person. NARRATOR: Qazimaj's fabrications were falling apart,
00:35:44
but he continued to deny the evidence against him when he took the stand at Ipswich Crown Court.
00:35:51
At the trial, Qazimaj really dug his heels in. And he came back at every single piece of evidence that was
00:35:58
presented by the prosecution. He questioned the validity of it. He really did not make it very easy.
00:36:05
Qazimaj insisted in the witness box that the fingerprints were planted, that he was a victim of mistaken identity,
00:36:15
that he had nothing to do with this killings, he was entirely innocent. It was flimsy beyond words.
00:36:24
And also, he starts to take on the victim role at this point as well. He says, I've been set up by the police.
00:36:30
They have deliberately fabricated this evidence. Poor me. So that's a slight change in tactic.
00:36:36
It's a way of trying to get people to feel sorry for him, but his story is so incredulous that that's
00:36:42
never going to happen. NARRATOR: Defiant to the end, Qazimaj was even given the chance to prove his innocence
00:36:54
by the prosecution. KARIM KHALIL QC: I recall eventually giving him the opportunity as he was in the witness box
00:37:00
to clear his name absolutely by way of inviting him to agree to provide fingerprints whilst giving evidence
00:37:09
under the supervision of his defense team, with scientists from both prosecution and defense present
00:37:16
and having controlled examination of those fingerprints, which could then be compared,
00:37:21
of course, with the disputed fingerprints that we'd heard so much about during the course of the trial.
00:37:26
And he quietly declined that invitation. And so the inference was obvious for the jury,
00:37:32
I'm sure from that. But he seemed neither embarrassed nor anxious about being presented with that opportunity.
00:37:39
He simply declined it and moved on. So quite a cold, careful, calculated man, who plainly had no concern for what he had done,
00:37:48
had achieved his end, and was obviously seeking to avoid the consequences. NARRATOR: On the 13th of March, 2017,
00:38:01
the jury took just three hours to find Ali Qazimaj guilty of both murders. The following day, the 44-year-old former carer
00:38:10
was sentenced to life. ANDY BAKER: As he was led from the dock on conviction and again found guilty of murder,
00:38:17
life mandatory, with a recommendation to serve 35 years, which will mean that he
00:38:22
will serve to his late 70s. GEOFFREY WANSELL: The judge calls the crimes terrible.
00:38:27
The judge also describes Qazimaj, which I think is very accurate, as a ruthless and accomplished
00:38:34
killer. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: Other people are simply a means to an end for him. He doesn't see them as people with lives and rights
00:38:42
and connections to other people. They're simply a barrier that's in the way
00:38:46
of him getting what he wants. And that results in some incredibly evil behavior.
00:38:53
NARRATOR: Qazimaj's plan of pretending to be someone else had backfired spectacularly.
00:38:59
ZACH WARD: I'd probably describe Qazimaj as a bit of a chancer to go to court and say that it's not me,
00:39:05
you've got the wrong person, and it's mistaken identity, in this day and age where there's overwhelming evidence
00:39:10
to suggest otherwise takes a piece of a brass neck to try and get away with that.
00:39:15
I think we're in the realms of, like, the dog ate my homework territory. And I just think there is no way he wasn't
00:39:21
going to go down for it when you look at the evidence that was there. NARRATOR: In a statement released during the trial,
00:39:27
Qazimaj addressed the victim's family directly. He has never disclosed the whereabouts
00:39:33
of Sylvia Stuart's remains. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: He says, I'm very sorry for your family,
00:39:37
but I can't tell you where your mother is, because I didn't kill her. And this is something that he was very,
00:39:46
very intent on keeping going. And I think, in a way, this gives him a sense of control,
00:39:53
because there are lots of things in his life that he has no control over now, but this
00:39:57
is one of those things. He has that knowledge. He has the information. There is no doubt that this is the man who murdered Sylvia.
00:40:03
And he's going to maintain that position, unfortunately I feel, for a very long time.
00:40:09
GEOFFREY WANSELL: Neither Peter nor Sylvia deserved to die. The amount of money that he managed to extract from them,
00:40:16
a few pounds, would have done nothing to settle any of his gambling debts. I think he killed them because he didn't know what else to do.
00:40:24
That was the only way his mind worked. And even shortly after his conviction and imprisonment,
00:40:31
it was hoped that Ali Qazimaj might provide information to help the police find Sylvia's body,
00:40:38
to give some small comfort to her family. There was an initial request that he was willing to speak
00:40:44
to the police, but that then came to nothing, and he has said no more. ZACH WARD: I think that will always be the thing that will
00:40:52
shock me, and sadly, I think it's probably a secret that he'll take to his grave.
00:41:01
NARRATOR: Qazimaj's silence means that he will never be eligible for an early release
00:41:06
from prison. ELIZABETH YARDLEY: There has been a recent piece of legislation passed in England and Wales,
00:41:11
when killers refuse to reveal the location of their victim's remains, they're not able to get parole.
00:41:18
So I think this might become more relevant to this case as the years go by, because Qazimaj, if he continues
00:41:25
to deny responsibility, if he continues to conceal the whereabouts of Sylvia's body,
00:41:31
he's never getting out of prison. ANDY BAKER: He appealed in 2019 against the conviction,
00:41:37
and that appeal wasn't upheld. So he's been through a full trial and an appeal.
00:41:42
And he remains convicted of the double murder. And there's no doubt that he murdered them for gain.
00:41:49
He needed money. He wanted money, and that was the quickest way he could get money.
00:41:53
GEOFFREY WANSELL: I would say Qazimaj is a truly ruthless man, who knows no bounds
00:41:58
to what he's prepared to do. And I think that perhaps it was easy to overlook
00:42:02
that ruthlessness behind this apparent facade of caring. Qazimaj was an evil, calculating killer
00:42:11
who lived in a fantasy world and was prepared to murder people for his own gains.
00:42:16
For the family's sake, I hope that one day Qazimaj would own up on what he's actually done so they
00:42:22
can have closure on this awful part of their lives. NARRATOR: Qazimaj arrived on British soil as an enigma.
00:42:35
If he served in the Albanian Special Forces or was a trained assassin, only he knows for sure.
00:42:43
What is in no doubt is there he abused his position as a carer to fund a gambling addiction and killed two innocent victims
00:42:52
for no other reason than to steal their money, making Ali Qazimaj one of the world's most evil killers.
00:43:01
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