A drug line “bully” who subjected a vulnerable man to weeks of abuse before leaving him to die has been jailed
A “violent bully” has been jailed for 12 years after he forced a vulnerable man to sleep beside dogs in a garage, treated him like his “lackey” and beat him to death over five weeks.
Former chef Dimitrios Tsavdaris, 55, known as Jimmy, was found dead inside a “cuckoo” flat in north London after he succumbed to a campaign of violence by Bamidele Fawehinmi.
The frail crack cocaine addict, who weighed just over eight stone, had been dead or dying with no way to summon help for several days before his body was discovered on January 29, 2024.
Previously, he had been found outside a school in fear for his safety after being assaulted in November 2023, but discharged himself from hospital.
He then suffered at least three separate violent assaults in the five weeks before death, resulting in fractures to his ribs, chest and head, as well as brain injuries.
Drug dealer Fawehinmi transported seriously injured Mr Tsavdaris to Hackney from his home in Wickford, Essex, where the victim had slept on a mattress in a garage beside American pitbull cross-breed dogs.
Mr Tsavdaris had been tasked with looking after the defendant’s dogs, with 14 puppies seen in the garden at one point, the court heard.
Police were alerted to his death after the defendant’s father “did the right thing” and reported it.
Fawehinmi tried to flee to Nigeria but was arrested on January 30 2024 after his hire car triggered a camera on the M11.
Mr Tsavdaris’s blood was found at the Wickford property and in the Kia car the defendant used to move him to Hackney, the court was told.
Fawehinmi, 33, from Haringey, north London, pleaded guilty to manslaughter and causing grievous bodily harm part-way through a retrial in March. An earlier jury cleared him of murder and failed to reach a verdict on a charge of servitude.
On Friday, Judge Mark Lucraft KC sentenced Fawehinmi to 12 years in prison, saying he had treated his victim like his “lackey” and kept him in “squalid” conditions.
He said it was “deeply shocking” to see the impact that addiction to class A drugs had on the human body.
In a victim impact statement, former wife Andrea Lavor described the man she knew before his life was taken over by addiction.
She said: “Dimitrios was the love of my life and the father of our son, Antonio.
“He was much more than the vulnerable man described in court. He came from a good family, was proud of his Pontic Greek heritage, loved music, loved life, and was a caring, kind and loving father.
“The loss of Dimitrios has devastated our family. Nothing can replace the father my son has lost, and every day we live with the pain of knowing he will never be able to share future milestones with him. Watching my son suffer this loss has been one of the hardest things I have ever experienced.
“I want people to remember Dimitrios for the person he truly was: intelligent, compassionate, funny, and deeply loved by those who knew him.”
Detective Superintendent Kelly Allen, from Scotland Yard, said: “I cannot imagine the pain and suffering Dimitrios must have gone through in the final weeks of his life, enslaved by Bamidele Fawehinmi and living in fear for his life.
“Dimitrios was a frail man who did not pose a threat to Fawehinmi. His initial claim in police interview that he acted in self-defence is utterly preposterous, and the words of a coward.
“Fawehinmi is a violent bully who preyed on vulnerable people to exploit them for his own gain.
“His conviction will not erase the pain felt by Dimitrios’s family, but I hope the fact he will spend a significant period of time behind bars brings them some small sense of justice.”
Mr Tsavdaris’s son Antonio was about to start a “dream job” as a head chef at a restaurant when he was told about his father’s death.
He said: “How can someone treat another human being like this? It was such a horrible way for him to die.
“The man who killed him has shown no remorse.”
Fawehinmi had previous convictions for criminal damage and common assault in 2015 and he admitted selling crack cocaine.
