Dealer who supplied lethal drugs to Grindr serial killer avoids jail sentence
A man who supplied drugs to serial killer Stephen Port has been sentenced to community service.
Stephen Port, 41, of Barking, east London was jailed for life last month after being found guilty of killing Anthony Walgate, Gabriel Kovari, Daniel Whitworth, and Jack Taylor.
The former chef hunted young gay men on hook-up apps, before luring them to his house, drugging them with GHB, and sexually assaulting them. Some victims, who have been granted anonymity, survived the attacks.
The killings took place between June 2014 and September 2015, but a series of police blunders meant officers failed to make connections between them or investigate Port, who was already known to authorities.
This week, a drug dealer was sentenced for selling mephedrone and GHB to Port.
Gerald Matovu, 23, had admitted supplying Class B drug mephedrone (commonly known as Meow Meow), and Class C drug GHB to Port.
Matovu was sentenced today to 12 months’ community service, 150 hours of unpaid work and 40 days of drug rehabilitation.
The offences came to light during the investigation into Port’s crimes.
Port was sentenced to a whole life term in November 2016 for the murder of four young gay men and drugging and sexually assaulting another seven victims.
According to the Metropolitan Police, Port bought the drugs from Matovu for use during consensual sex with his partner.
Phone records and downloads from electronic devices belonging to Port clearly showed contact with Matovu and Port had described Matovu as his drug dealer to his partner.
In messages, Matovu told Port he had “loads of G” and asked how much he wanted.
Matovu was arrested on 15 June 2016 and charged on 27 October 2016.
An Independent Police Complaints Commission probe of the Port case is ongoing, over allegations that police officers missed a string of red flags that Port was connected to the deaths.
After the first death in June 2014, Port was charged with perverting the course of justice for filing a false police report. The killer told authorities he found Anthony Walgate’s body lying unconscious in the street, but police later discovered he had hired him via an online gay escort service.
Despite Port already being known to police, officers failed to make the connection to the subsequent deaths of Gabriel Kovari and Daniel Whitworth, who were killed within days of eachother in August 2014. The deaths were treated as “unexplained”, but no murder investigation took place.
Over the next few months, Mr Kovari’s former flatmate John Pape raised concerns about a possible link between the deaths – but the Met confirmed to the Barking and Dagenham Post and PinkNews that the deaths were not being treated as suspicious, denying possibility of a link.
At the time, Det Ch Insp Tony Kirk said: “We do get sudden deaths on a very regular basis… there’s nothing, at the moment, suspicious about any of them.”
Port was jailed in March 2015 on the perverting the course of justice charge, but after being released killed his fourth victim, Jack Taylor, in September 2015. The fourth death finally prompted the Met to launch a murder inquiry. Port was arrested on suspicion of murder a month later.
The probe is ongoing.
