Ian Huntley remains close to death after having his skull shattered with a metal pole wielded by a fellow inmate who had triumphantly yelled: ‘I’ve done it. I’ve killed him’.
The convicted child murderer was rushed to hospital after being attacked in a workshop at HMP Frankland – dubbed ‘Monster Mansion’ because it is home so many killers and paedophiles.
Multiple prison sources suspect that Anthony Russell, a 43-year-old triple murderer and rapist also serving a whole life prison sentence, was the person who launched the attack.
After Huntley was beaten around the head three times, witnesses claim Russell was held by prison officers after shouting in celebration: ‘I’ve done it, I’ve done it. I’ve killed him, I’ve killed him.’
Police are expected to issue an update on his condition but he is known to be gravely ill.
Huntley was found with catastrophic head injuries in a pool of his own blood around 9.30am on Thursday with many inmates said to have cheered rather than rush to his aid.
A prison source told the Daily Mail: ‘Huntley was working in waste management with other prisoners from Wing A, the segregated wing for prisoners who can’t be in the normal jail population for their own protection.
‘The other prisoner got a metal bar from the waste metal crates and smashed Huntley three times in the head with it. It was a very, very serious injury, having been struck on the skull like that.’
It is believed a fight broke out between the two prisoners, before Russell swung at Huntley with the metal pole, hitting him with such force that part of the bar was lodged inside of him.
Ian Huntley is serving life for murdering two 10-year-old girls in his home in Soham, a Cambridgeshire market town made infamous by his vile crimes in 2002
It is suspected that Anthony Russell, a 43-year-old triple murderer, was the one who led the assault
Best friends Holly Wells (left) and Jessica Chapman (right) were murdered by Huntley
Despite officers fearing that Huntley had died at the scene due to the extent of his injuries and concerns he was ‘not breathing’, paramedics managed to put him in a medically induced coma and transport him to hospital.
He is said to remain there in a critical condition.
The source said Wing A is made up of inmates at risk of attack from other prisoners, such as sex offenders or jailed police officers, so to protect them they move around the prison as a group, and remain segregated from the others.
One woman, who visited an inmate housed alongside Huntley, told the Daily Mail it looked like he had been ‘ripped apart like a rat’.
She added: ‘He’s in a bad, bad way. I shouldn’t say it, but it’s what he deserves.’
Another source said the double killer’s condition was ‘touch and go’ and described the scene on the wing as ‘absolute chaos’.
Suspected attacker Russell was charged with the murder of Julie Williams and her son David Williams, as well as the rape and murder of pregnant Nicole McGregor near Leamington Spa in 2022.
At the time West Midlands Police believed Mr Williams was strangled with a lanyard due to Russell’s ‘mistaken belief that he was in a relationship with his girlfriend’.
He then went on to kill Mr Williams’ 58-year-old mother in an attack that inflicted 113 separate injuries.
Before later assaulting Ms McGregor, who was five months pregnant, just hours after she showed him a picture of her baby scan and then pretending to help Ms McGregor’s partner look for her.
The Sun reported his celebratory cheers, and fellow lags’ too, in the wake of the attack.
This is the third time Huntley has been attacked in jail. In 2010, his throat was slashed with a homemade weapon and, in 2005, another inmate threw boiling water over him.
Last year, he was said to have been strutting around the jail wearing a No 10 Manchester United-style shirt in an apparent vile taunt about his victims.
HMP Frankland on Thursday after Ian Huntley was attacked inside by another inmate
Huntley lied in court that Holly (right) had drowned in his bath and that he had accidentally suffocated Jessica (left) while attempting to stop her from screaming
Huntley was convicted of the murders after pleading not guilty. His girlfriend at the time Maxine Carr (right) gave him a false alibi but turned on him in the witness box
I’m Sam Greenhill, Chief Reporter, and nearly 25 years ago I had an encounter with killer Ian Huntley that still sends shivers down my spine.
Huntley is one Britain’s most notorious child murderers. But when I was invited into his home for tea and biscuits days before he was arrested for the Soham Murders, this was the last thing on my mind. I’ve written about it in The Crime Desk newsletter – sign up to read it for free.
A photo of the schoolgirls wearing matching football shirts – tragically taken on the day Huntley lured them into his house – became synonymous with the desperate search which gripped the country.
A spokesperson for Durham Constabulary said: ‘The 52-year-old prisoner who was injured during this morning’s assault in the workshop at HMP Frankland remains in a serious condition in hospital following treatment for head injuries.
‘Police forensic teams have examined the scene of the attack throughout the day to gather evidence.
‘A suspect, a male prisoner in his mid-40s, has been identified by officers investigating the incident. He has not been arrested at this stage, but remains in detention within the prison.’
School caretaker Huntley lured both schoolgirls into his home and murdered them, before dumping their bodies in a ditch some 12 miles away.
He would later return and attempt to set fire to them.
They were not discovered until more than a week after they went missing, by which time some 400 police officers had joined with local residents to search for the missing youngsters.
Holly and Jessica, who were best friends, had gone out to buy sweets on the afternoon of August 4, 2002, when he lured them into his three-bedroom cottage.
Their disappearance after a family barbecue sent shockwaves through the close-knit community and became one of the most sickening child murders the country has ever seen.
Suspicions about Huntley were raised after he appeared to tell one journalist in morbid detail how the girls might react to being taken by a stranger.
He was convicted in 2003 of both murders, having pleaded not guilty. Huntley was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum term of 40 years.
His then-fiancée Maxine Carr, who was a teaching assistant at the girls’ school, would also be jailed for three-and-a-half years after giving her partner a false alibi in a bid to help him evade justice.
She famously turned on her partner at court and Huntley was convicted, having tried to claim he had killed both girls accidentally.
Anthony Russell was charged with the rape and murder of Nicole McGregor near Leamington Spa, who was five months pregnant at the time
Anthony Russell was charged with the murder of David Williams (pictured left) and his mother Julie Williams (right)
ulie Williams and her son David (pictured) had more than 150 injuries between them after being killed by Anthony Russell in two separate violent attacks in Coventry, a court previously heard
He lied that Holly had drowned in his bath and that he had accidentally suffocated Jessica while attempting to stop her from screaming.
The case prompted an inquiry into how Huntley slipped through police vetting procedures despite a string of sex allegations made against him in his hometown, Grimsby, in the late 1990s.
The report from the inquiry revealed a ‘deeply shocking’ catalogue of errors across all organisations that had contact with Huntley before he murdered Holly and Jessica.
It made 31 recommendations to improve intelligence sharing, police information systems and employment vetting nationwide.
Huntley has previously been attacked in prison, most notably by armed robber Damien Fowkes in 2010, who slashed his throat.
Using a home-made weapon, Fowkes slashed him causing a ‘severe gaping cut to the left side of his neck’. The wound was 7in (18cm) long and required 21 stitches.
At the time Fowkes asked a prison officer: ‘Is he dead? I hope so.’
A fellow prisoner also attempted to shank Huntley in an ambush in 2018.
In 2005, fellow murderer Mark Hobson also threw boiling water over him in Wakefield Prison.
His crimes continue to cause outrage behind bars, as has Huntley’s brazen behaviour while on remand.
In 2018 Huntley appeared to confess to deliberately killing Jessica to stop her from raising the alarm. He continued to insist that Holly’s death was an accident.
After Carr had served her prison sentence, she was released in 2004 with a brand new identity.
