WARNING: Distressing content: Anna Podedworna is accused of the murder of Izabela Zablocka, who was killed in 2010 but whose body was only discovered last year
A Polish mother, who was discovered buried in a garden after being missing for nearly 15 years, was murdered, dismembered and put into bin bags by her girlfriend, a court has been told.
The jury heard that Anna Podedworna, aged 40, attempted to conceal the murder of Izabela Zablocka with a series of “deliberate, calculated, gruesome and time-consuming acts” following her killing in 2010. Podedworna, whose relationship with Ms Zablocka was described as “stormy and turbulent” by the court, is charged with murder between 27 August and 1 October 2010, preventing a lawful burial and perverting the course of justice between 27 August 2010 and 2 June 2025.
Dressed in a grey sweatshirt and black glasses, the defendant, from Boyer Street, Derby, listened in the dock with the assistance of a Polish interpreter, while prosecutor Gordon Aspden KC presented the case against her at Derby Crown Court on Thursday.
Mr Aspden informed the jury of seven women and five men that Ms Zablocka, who was 30 at the time of her “violent death”, had grown up in Trzebiatow in north-west Poland.
He stated: “In her early 20s, Izabela married a local Polish man and she gave birth to a daughter who they named Katarzyna.
“Sadly, the marriage between Izabela and her husband did not last, they separated and soon afterwards Izabela began a sexual relationship with this defendant, Anna Podedworna.”
The court heard that the two women had shared a flat in Poland before relocating to the UK in 2009 in search of employment, initially residing in London before moving to a small terraced house in Normanton, Derby. Both Ms Zablocka and the accused were employed at a poultry factory named Cranberry Foods, the jury was informed.
After a phone call to her mother on 28 August 2010, it was revealed that Ms Zablocka’s family, including her daughter who remained in Poland, lost contact with her.
Mr Aspden stated: “The Crown’s case is that shortly after Izabela’s final telephone call to her mother, this defendant Anna Podedworna murdered her. Having done so, she then dismembered Izabela’s body by cutting it in half with a large knife, trussed it up with electrical tape, placed these now bloody human remains in black plastic bin bags, and buried them in the back garden.
“A section of concrete hardstanding was then laid over the top to hide Izabela’s filthy, makeshift grave.”
‘Taped in black bags’
The prosecutor added: “The defendant’s post-murder cover-up involved a series of deliberate, calculated, gruesome and time-consuming acts which she carried out with resolve and purpose over a period of several days. Precisely how and why the defendant murdered Izabela only she now knows and, for obvious reasons, she will never reveal.”
The court was told that Ms Zablocka’s family reported her missing to the UK police in November 2010 before reaching out to Polish authorities in January 2011. When officers questioned Podedworna, she claimed she had no idea where Ms Zablocka was, which Mr Aspden described as “all lies and a continuation of the post-murder cover-up”.
The prosecutor explained that “mounting pressure” led Podedworna to “crack” last year when a Polish television journalist travelled to the UK to interview her. She subsequently emailed Derbyshire Police saying she had evidence and later attended a police station, the court was told.
Mr Aspden revealed what she told officers: “The defendant admitted she had killed Izabela. However, now, and for the first time, she claimed that Izabela died by accident during a violent confrontation between them and that during that violent confrontation she had done nothing more than defend herself.
“This new and freshly-created claim of self-defence was yet another lie by this defendant to conceal her guilt, to cover up the murder and to deceive and hoodwink those around her.”
Police discovered Ms Zablocka’s remains in the garden of a property in Princes Street, Normanton, where the pair had lived together, jurors heard.
Podedworna denies all charges against her.
The trial continues.
