A killer who tried to emulate Jack the Ripper has been convicted of murdering two young mothers at the start of what might have become a killing spree.
Loner Derek Brown butchered DVD seller Xiao Mei Guo and prostitute Bonnie Barrett in his flat and disposed of their bodies, which have never been found.
Police believe he might have killed before and are combing crime files across the country to see if his details match up with other cases.
Brown, 48, who craved notoriety, picked up the young women in the same Whitechapel area of east London stalked by the Ripper more than a century ago. Already a serial sex attacker, detectives believe he would have become a serial killer if he had not been stopped.
Inquiries have since revealed the convicted rapist was also a suspect in a third "historic" murder hunt outside London. The father of seven has in addition been identified by victims in five other rapes over two decades and is suspected of carrying out further sex attacks.
Following the case, a nationwide review will be launched to establish whether Brown, originally from Preston, Lancs, is linked to any further unsolved crimes.
The bodies of Mrs Guo and Miss Barrett have never been found, despite 800 hours of police searches and a trawl of the Thames by divers.
Old Bailey jurors heard that 65 separate traces of the women's blood were found spattered around the floors, walls and ceiling of his flat in Rotherhithe, south east London.
Mrs Guo, a 29-year-old illegal immigrant, was last seen, with Brown, on CCTV images taken outside Whitechapel Tube station on August 29 last year. Miss Barrett, 24, a crack addict who had previously been paid for sex by Brown, disappeared just half a mile away on September 18.
Read More
Sentencing was adjourned until Monday when Judge Martin Stephens warned Brown he would face a life sentence with a minimum term that was "very substantial indeed" in what he called a "terrible case".
