Hundreds of mourners held a candle-lit vigil marking a year since Sarah Everard was kidnapped and murdered by a serving Metropolitan Police officer.

The crowd marched through south London before laying flowers at Clapham Common bandstand, close to where the 33-year-old was abducted.

They paid tribute to Sarah and spoke about violence against women.

Sarah was raped and killed by Met officer Wayne Couzens, who staged a fake arrest as she walked home in south London on March 3, 2021.

Couzens was jailed for life in September last year.

At the vigil, mourners held a minute’s silence and read speeches calling for change.

Organiser Madison Hall said she wanted people to ‘come together to commemorate all victims of gendered violence’.

She said it was an opportunity to ‘pay respect to and remember those women that have lost their lives.’

Ms Hall, who lives in nearby Stockwell, added: ‘It’s been quite overwhelming to be honest.

‘It has been weird seeing somewhere you live as a dangerous place to live.’

The vigil was set up by the Urban Angels group, which aims to make society safer for women and non-binary people.

A similar tribute was staged outside Kelvingrove Art Gallery in central Glasgow.

Earlier on Thursday, women’s rights activists stretched police tape across the entrance of the New Scotland Yard building in protest at the Met’s handling of the case.

The Women’s Equality Party said its activists designated the force’s headquarters ‘a crime scene’ to ‘illustrate the police’s culpability in her death’. 

They said little has changed for women in the year since Sarah’s murder.

At the vigil, mourners described their own experiences of feeling unsafe.

Shae Bampfield, who lives in Clapham, said she had to run from a man who followed her on the way home.

‘I made a police report but there were no cameras so it couldn’t go anywhere,’ she said. ‘It just really hits home how unsafe it can be on the streets for women at any time.’

She said recognising misogyny as a hate crime would help protect women.

Sarah’s family said they had been overwhelmed by kindness on the anniversary of her death.

They said: ‘It is a year since Sarah died and we remember her today, as every day, with all our love.

‘Our lives have changed forever and we live with the sadness of our loss.

‘Sarah was wonderful and we miss her all the time.

‘Over the past year we have been overwhelmed with the kindness shown to us, not just by family and friends, but by the wider public.

‘We are immensely grateful to everyone for their support, it has meant such a lot to us and has comforted us through this terrible time.

‘Sadly, Sarah is not the only woman to have lost her life recently in violent circumstances and we would like to extend our deepest sympathy to other families who are also grieving.’

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