Soham killer Ian Huntley has been blinded and is not expected to regain consciousness following an attack inside a high-security prison, according to reports.
The Sun newspaper said the 52-year-old suffered severe brain trauma in the attack at HMP Frankland, Durham, on 26 February.
The former school caretaker, who murdered 10-year-olds Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in 2002, has been kept on life support in hospital after being hit repeatedly over the head by an inmate armed with a metal bar.
The Sun reported that the attack had left Huntley blind, and it quoted a source saying: “Huntley never recovered from the battering and never stood much of a chance of doing so.”
Murderer and rapist Anthony Russell, 43, reportedly shouted “I’ve done it, I’ve done it” after Huntley was attacked in the recycling area of the prison.
Durham Constabulary has not identified the suspect but it said on the day of the attack that a man in his mid-40s had been detained.
After the attack, Huntley’s only daughter Samantha Bryan, 27, told The Sun on Sunday of her father: “There’s a special place in hell waiting for him.”
Huntley murdered Holly and Jessica after they left a family barbecue to buy sweets in Soham, Cambridgeshire, on 4 August 2002. He dumped their bodies in a ditch.
Russell was sentenced to a whole-life tariff in 2021 for the murders of Julie Williams, 58, and her son David Williams, 32, at separate flats in Coventry, and pregnant 31-year-old Nicole McGregor, who was found in woodland near Leamington Spa three days later.
Russell had also raped Ms McGregor.
The Frankland attack was the latest attempt on Huntley’s life and he was thought to have been kept under close observation to prevent such attacks.
In 2010, robber Damien Fowkes slashed him with a home-made weapon, causing a “severe, gaping cut to the left side of his neck” with a 7in (18cm) wound which required 21 stitches.
Fowkes asked a prison officer: “Is he dead? I hope so.”
He described Huntley as a “notorious child killer, both inside prison and in society in general”.
Huntley’s life sentence recommended he serve at least 40 years for the Soham murders.
