Butcher who murdered girlfriend and buried her remains in garden is facing jail

A Polish poultry butcher who murdered her partner before cutting her body in two and burying her remains in the garden has finally been brought to justice 15 years later.

Anna Podedworna, 40, killed Izabela Zablocka before trussing her up ‘like a chicken’ with electrical tape and burying her remains in bin bags in a ‘filthy, makeshift grave’.

She claimed to have hit Ms Zablocka over the head in self-defence after the 30-year-old mum of one tried to strangle her during a row at their home in Normanton, Derby, in August 2010.

But instead of calling for an ambulance, jurors at the city’s crown court heard she took two weeks off work and began the ‘gruesome and time-consuming’ task of disposing of her body.

Podedworna told the jury she could not lift Ms Zablocka’s body and so decided to ‘cut her in two’, saying ‘it seemed the only way at the time’.

She said: ‘I was just terrified, I felt fear. I thought I will bury her. I took the decision I would bury her in the garden.

‘I wanted to pick her up whole. I just did not have the strength to pick her up. I had an idea to cut her down. It seemed the only way… to cut her into two.’

The court heard ‘considerable force’ would have been needed to cut Ms Zablocka’s body in half, and that her legs had been bound together before she was buried.

Podedworna was a skilled butcher at a poultry factory called Cranberry Foods in Scropton, Derbyshire, at the time.

Prosecutor Gordon Aspden KC had told the court: ‘Her work had involved skinning, deboning, and portioning out turkey carcasses using a large knife.’

Podedworna was found guilty of murder, preventing a lawful burial and perverting the course of justice.

The court heard the pair came to live in the UK in 2009.

Ms Zablocka’s young daughter remained in Poland living with relatives and she would call them every few days.

But she lost contact with her family in August 2010 and was reported to the police as missing.

Despite several attempts by them to get the police to investigate her disappearance, no trace was ever found and the trail remained cold.

That was until 2024, when Ms Zablocka’s daughter – by then an adult – contacted a Polish missing persons organisation about her mother.

After several publicised appeals for information, a Polish journalist took up the search and contacted Podedworna with a view to interviewing her about the case.

Mr Aspden said this ‘mounting pressure’ caused Podedworna to ‘crack’ and email the police last year claiming to have information.

The journalist turned up on her doorstep later the same day and his interview with Podedworna was later shown in evidence at her murder trial.

She later confessed to police that Ms Zablocka was buried under concrete hardstanding in the garden of the terraced house they had once shared.

Samantha Shallow from the Crown Prosecution Service said: ‘Izabela Zablocka came to Derby in search of a new life with her partner, but instead met her death.

‘Anna Podedworna not only brutally murdered her partner, but she subjected Izabela’s loved ones to 15 years of uncertainty and anguish, not knowing if she was alive or dead.

‘Podedworna hid the truth for years, but justice has caught up with her.

‘Her callous actions took a mother and daughter away from her family and denied them the opportunity to grieve her passing and lay her to rest.’

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