Manager of law firm killed as woman armed with butcher’s knife runs amok

The two victims were attacked in Bexleyheath, south-east London. The woman who died was last night named as law firm accounts manager Sally Hodkin, 59.

The suspected attacker walked into a tile shop with blood on one hand, telling the manager to call the police because she had “hurt somebody”.

Sources said the 32-year-old bought a blade from a nearby Asda store early yesterday before she attacked a 23-year-old woman waiting at a nearby bus stop, slashing her hand.

She then fled the scene, going next into the British Meat Market store, some 150 yards away, where she threatened the manager and made off with another knife, which she used to kill her second Mrs Hodkin.

She is understood to have been on her way to work when she was stabbed in the neck and was pronounced dead minutes later, at 8.41am.

Ryan Higgins, manager at the UK TileCentres shop yards from the murder scene, said: “A woman came through the front door at about 8.30am with blood on her hand and told me she had hurt somebody and that I should call the police.”

Detective Superintendent Keith Niven, of the Met’s Homicide and Serious Crime Command, said there was no information to suggest the victims were known to each other or to the suspect.

Shops closed their doors as detectives and forensic officers investigated the attacks and part of the road was cordoned off.

A blue tarpaulin was erected on Albion Road where the body was found. Officers recovered a knife from the scene.