Britain's most notorious child killer dies after prison attack
Ian Huntley, one of Britain’s most notorious child killers, has died in HM Frankland Prison in Durham, in the north-east of England. He died after an attack in the maximum-security jail, with a police spokesperson saying he died in hospital this morning. Huntley was convicted in 2003 of killing two ten-year-old girls, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, in eastern England in August 2002, a case that shocked the nation. He had been serving a life sentence for the murders when he sustained serious injuries in an attack at the prison on 26 February.
Huntley killed the two girls after they left a family barbecue to buy sweets in the village of Soham, Cambridgeshire, on 4 August 2002. A Ministry of Justice spokesperson described the murders as among the most shocking and tragic episodes in the country’s history. “The disappearance of the two girls sparked a massive search involving hundreds of officers and appeals to the public for help,” the official said. The girls’ bodies were found almost two weeks later in a ditch a few miles from the original location. The photographs of the girls wearing Manchester United shirts were instantly recognisable to many Britons.
When Huntley, then 28 and employed as a school caretaker, gave a media interview claiming to be gravely concerned for the girls’ safety, police began to suspect him. He denied involvement, but was found guilty at his 2003 trial. His girlfriend at the time, Maxine Carr, who was a teaching assistant at the victims’ school, provided a false alibi for Huntley and was jailed for obstructing the course of justice; she now lives under a new identity.
It later emerged that Huntley had previously been the subject of complaints connected with rape and sexual offences, prompting criminal-background checks for anyone working with children. He had also been attacked in prison on several occasions, with the most serious assaults occurring in 2005 and 2010.
Police investigations into the circumstances surrounding the incident are ongoing, a police spokesperson said, adding that prosecutors would consider charging the attacker.