‘My boyfriend was stabbed 30 times by a satanic pedophile – please never let his killer out of jail’

A man whose childhood friend was stabbed to death in the middle of Covent Garden by a satanic pedophile has spoken out after discovering his killer could be free within months.

Edward Crowley, a homeless devil worshiper who named himself after infamous Satanist Aleister Crowley, was jailed for life for stabbing 12-year-old Diego Pineiro-Villar 30 times with a kitchen knife on May 7, 2000. was eligible for parole in August 2022 and although his first attempt at release was denied, he is now allowed to reapply.

Shocked by the news that his school friend’s killer could soon be walking the streets again, William Reed has spoken to the Mirror after it fueled his determination to seek justice for Diego and prevent future tragedies. William and Diego both arrived in England in 1997 and were in the same class at the Vicente Cañada Blanch Spanish school in Portobello Road, London.

William said the couple were both new and only spoke Spanish compared to their bilingual classmates, creating an instant bond. He said: “We were very close for the first few years, we could only speak Spanish, so we laughed and joked together. Our lives then were just like in Spain, we played outside, but that changed. It felt like a slow process, as time went on the fear grew, he wasn’t his normal self.”

Diego, a kind-hearted boy, had met Crowley when he intervened to stop other children from throwing rocks at him in a playground. However, Crowley became obsessed with the youngster and stalked him for a year.

William recalled: “I remember an incident at school in 1999, I was walking to school and saw Diego running away from the school, very scared. I tried to ask him if he was okay, but he ignored me, at that time I This man, who ran after him, was really shocked, but I just kept walking to school.”

It was Crowley who saw young William. He was later arrested three times and charged with gross indecency and intimidation. He was eventually remanded in custody for three months when he was charged with indecency and intimidation. Despite his apparent obsession with Diego, he was released on bail after the indecency charge was dropped. Just six weeks later, he attacked and killed Diego.

William described losing his friend at such a young age as a pivotal moment in his life. He said: “After seeing him at school, that was the first time we really knew what was going on. Diego always joked and laughed, but from then on he was always gloomy.

“He talked about, ‘If I die, can you wear white to my funeral,’ we were kids, I just didn’t really think it would happen. I just thought he was in denial, but for me from then on, everything changed. After Diego was killed, I no longer felt safe, an adult, or my 17 year old sister walking with me everywhere. Everything felt very real.

“It felt like the whole system was broken. I felt that even then it felt very clear that he was going to hurt Diego. All the signs were already there, but he was still released.”

Two years after Diego’s death, a report from all agencies involved in the case noted failures in communication and criticized the police and the Crown Prosecution Service, but said blame for the boy’s death lay solely with his murderer. At the time, Diego’s mother Angela Fernandez called it a “whitewash” and called the conclusions “disgusting”.

After reading the report, commissioned by the Metropolitan Police and Camden Council, Ms Fernandez said: “Saying there is no one who can save my son is a lie when there are so many agencies, the child protection committee, the police. I think it is. disgusting. They knew he (Crowley) was talking to him, but it was all in the hands of the police. If you can’t trust the police, who can you trust?

Jane Held, director of Camden Social Services, denied at the time that the report was a “whitewash”. She said: “We accept that there are many things we could have done differently and we will learn from them, but even if we had done them differently, tragically the death could not have been foreseen or prevented. In short, this means that Diego could only have been protected by removing him from his family, which was neither right nor desirable, or by removing Crowley from the streets – there were no legal reasons to do the latter.

After hearing the news that Crowley is now eligible for parole, William, who is still involved in London’s Spanish community, said he and Diego’s other school friends couldn’t believe it. William is a father himself and hopes to one day send his two-year-old daughter Stella to the same school he and Diego attended.

William added: “He took decades of life away from Diego and he hasn’t even served a year for every time he stabbed him. He stabbed him 30 times, but only served 23 years. It doesn’t feel like justice has been served. He is still a risk to our community, 100%.”

When asked if he wanted Crowley to die in prison, he replied: “Personally, yes, but I wonder if that sounds like revenge? I just feel like it doesn’t feel like justice has been served for Diego yet.”

William has launched a petition to the government calling for longer sentences for child murderers. It says: “We advocate the rigorous application of life sentences for convictions of infanticide, imposing a minimum of 30 years or life imprisonment without the possibility of early parole.”