Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.

ROMANS, CHAPTER 12, VERSE 19

Joanne Dennehy came into this world destined for a life of blood and carnage and the first to die was thirty-one-year-old Lukasz Slaboszewski who, in 2005, had moved to the UK from Nowa Sl, a town on the Oder River in western Poland. Up until the time of his death he was living at 695 Lincoln Road, Peterborough. Slaboszewski was employed by DHL at a warehouse in Peterborough and he enjoyed his job. Previously he had visited his family at Christmas, and the last time he contacted them was in early March 2013. Lukasz planned to see his sisters in London, later in the month. A happy-go-lucky man who enjoyed cards and music, he was, nevertheless, trying to kick a cocaine habit and had been prescribed methadone as a substitute to cure his addiction. The police confirm that he was not a tenant of Quicklet.

Without wishing to state the obvious, to avoid a killer you must know one is there. Like any victim falling prey to a predator, Lukasz didn’t realise until it was all too late. On Monday, 18 March 2013, he bumped into Joanne Dennehy –the police are inclined to think the meeting took place in Peterborough’s Queensgate shopping mall. It was a sunny day and the weather was perfect. He didn’t know Dennehy, was totally unaware of her existence and never could have guessed in a million years she had bloody murder on her mind, that she had been secretly watching him or that the blood she would spill would be his own – and a lot of it too.

If anything, hazel-eyed Lukasz was a little on the shy side. Therefore, it is highly likely that the well-spoken, gregarious Dennehy made the approach. Perhaps she flirted with him because she is very good at flirting. For his part, Slaboszewski would easily have been won over by her just like Kevin Lee. Nevertheless, she obtained his mobile number and, after they parted company, sent him a number of sexually explicit text messages to which he replied. That evening he somewhat prematurely texted a friend, saying he had found an English girlfriend and that ‘life is beautiful’. Lukasz was last seen alive leaving his home the following day, Tuesday, 19 March.

With Lukasz now unable to tell his side of the story, and Dennehy later giving responses of ‘No comment!’ to every question put to her by the Nationally Accredited interviewer DC Kim Bowen and DS Mark Jinks, DCI Martin Brunning and DS Andy Crocker are able to provide some of the known facts. There are a few obvious gaps, which I will fill in later, but it all makes for grim reading.

When Lukasz arrived at 11 Rolleston Garth, Joanne Dennehy opened the front door. Inviting him in, she explained that she was tidying the place up for her boss (Kevin Lee). A short while later – it might have been as soon as a few minutes – Slaboszewski was stabbed once through the heart with a 3-inch lock knife. The attack appears to have taken place in the kitchen, however his blood was also found close to the inside of the front door. It had been a blitz attack, one that came without warning. And it had to be this way for Lukasz was a powerfully built man while Dennehy was small in comparison and therefore could not afford to display her homicidal intent.

The police, the CPS, the pre-trial hearing judge Mr Justice Sweeney and the sentencing judge, Mr Justice Spencer, had always assumed that Dennehy was alone at 11 Rolleston Garth when Slaboszewski was murdered. Therefore, as Stretch was presumed not to be present when the killing took place he was not charged with any offence in connection with the murder – only one of preventing the lawful and decent burial of a human body [Slaboszewski] for which he was sentenced to seven and a half years. However, on Friday, 29 March 2014, DCI Martin Brunning received – via Daily Mirror journalist Louie Smith – copies of correspondence dated 17 February 2013, sent by Stretch to his former partner, Julie Gibbons. The letters proved to be a bombshell, for in one of them he confessed:

Gibbons also sent copies of Stretch’s letters to Joanne Dennehy at HMP Bronzefield. Dennehy replied, adding another level to Stretch’s involvement – that Stretch had actually watched her kill Slaboszewski:

Stretch’s timing of his 17 February letter to Gibbons was well thought out. By that date he had already been found guilty of a number of offences and was awaiting sentencing. However, at his trial the police and the Crown Prosecution Service were in complete ignorance of the fact that he had witnessed Slaboszewski’s and Lee’s murders, if not actually assisting Dennehy.

In a later telephone call to Stretch, Julie Gibbons asked why Dennehy had killed Slaboszewski.

‘Well, she’s just that way,’ he replied, ‘She’s off her head.’

‘Well, you should have run a mile,’ suggested Gibbons.

In an attempt to mitigate his involvement, again he said: ‘I didn’t know about it at first. I came down and there was a guy in the hallway. She said, “Oh, you need to help me get rid of him. Bin him!”’

Of course these admissions from Dennehy reveal more to us than she may have intended. The job she got for Stretch was acting for Kevin Lee as co-enforcer with her; the place for him to live was at 2 Riseholme. And the car? We’ll come back to that in the next chapter.

But, what of Lukasz?

The Rolleston Garth estate is well maintained and spaciously laid out. There is ample parking and the houses, though a little unusual in design, are appealing to look at – and to live in, one supposes, come to that. The layout of the estate is in no way cramped and the gardens at Rolleston Garth are surrounded by wooden fences – certainly too high to peek over – and therefore quite excellent to hide unpleasant things from prying eyes. So, Dennehy and Stretch dumped Lukasz’s body in a green wheelie bin parked in the garden to await disposal, but first transport was needed: they would have to get a car.

Shortly after the murder, Dennehy called Kevin Lee to explain that a man had been killed. According to police, whether or not she told Lee that the man had died at 11 Rolleston Garth is based on an element of conjecture. Whether or not she admitted that she was the culprit is also open to debate, but she did tell him that she needed money to buy a car to move the corpse.’ Kevin handed over the cash.

According to the police, just two days after Slaboszewski’s murder Dennehy and Stretch travelled by taxi to purchase a green Vauxhall Astra, registration number R660 ECT. Joanne didn’t have a driving licence but Stretch did. However, while he insisted the car be registered in her name secretly he insured the vehicle under the company name ‘Undertaker & Co.’ but failed to tell her. He nicknamed the Astra ‘The Hearse’. Later that evening the same vehicle was spotted being driven around remote areas on the outskirts of Peterborough – Dennehy and Stretch were looking for a suitable site to dispose of Lukasz’s body. The place they settled on was at Thorney Dyke, a remote location close to where Stretch had lived, some years earlier.

‘No one will ever find a body dumped there,’ Stretch later boasted to a woman called Georgina Page, whom Dennehy had met several years earlier while living in Kings Lynn with John Treanor.

In her letter to Julie Gibbons Dennehy mentioned the Vauxhall Astra:

In a dignified statement issued after his death had been confirmed, his sister, Magda Skrzypczak, said: ‘Lukasz was the joker in the family, always finding something to laugh about. His mum and dad are devastated by their loss, and he also leaves two grieving sisters.’