Murder on the Internet

S01E02 Episode two of the two-part series, DATED TO DEATH, tells stories of some of the shocking dangers of seeking love online; told through police archive and interviews with friends, families, police, lawyers, psychologists and dating experts. The first case is that of 27-year-old Luke Harlow, who met 15-year-old Leicestershire schoolgirl, Kayleigh Haywood on Facebook. After exchanging 2,600 messages over 13 days he enticed Kayleigh back to his flat. Kayleigh had told her parents she was staying with a friend for the weekend whereas in fact she was staying with serial groomer, Harlow. After consuming copious amounts of alcohol, she was introduced to Harlow’s next-door neighbour Stephen Beadman, who raped and murdered her. Next we have the case of 50-year-old Stefano Brizzi, the cannibal killer who used the dating app, Grindr, to lure a police officer, PC Gordon Temple, to his home where he butchered him and dissolved his body parts in acid. Taking inspiration from his favourite TV series, ‘Breaking Bad’, where the main character, a crystal meth cook, destroys a corpse using similar tools and chemicals. Brizzi has since been found dead in his cell at HMP Belmarsh. And the final case in the series, 35-year-old online dater Miles Donnelly, who promised a loving relationship to 44-year-old single mum, Usha Patel, only to violently stab her thirteen times with a bread knife. Usha Patel had met Donnelly on oasis.com and, after several months of exchanging messages, had invited him to her flat where he killed her. The following morning Usha’s father was met by his grandson, Usha’s son, who had been in the flat at the time of the murder.