Serial killer Stephen Griffiths was jailed for life 15 years ago and below we look at how the Crossbow Cannibal has dodged death on multiple occasions while locked up
This week marks 15 years since a serial killer who called himself the “Crossbow Cannibal” was jailed for life for killing, dismembering and eating three women. Stephen Griffiths, from Bradford, was caged on December 21, 2010, after admitting to taking the lives of Suzanne Blamires, 36, Shelley Armitage, 31, and Susan Rushworth, 43.
He was initially arrested after a caretaker found CCTV footage in May 2010 showing Suzanne sprinting from his apartment before Griffiths, armed with a crossbow, struck her unconscious and dragged her back inside. The monster smirked at the camera and raised his middle finger to it before cops swarmed his flat days later after they were alerted to the CCTV.
However, by the time they arrived, Griffiths had already killed Suzanne and disposed of her remains.
Adam Twigg was one of the West Yorkshire Police tactical officers who stormed the apartment. He found Griffiths sitting on his bed and, after reading him his rights, the killer replied: “I’m Osama bin Laden.”
Adam and his team then tried to find Suzanne, telling a Prime Video documentary: “There was a sizeable portion of a brain in the microwave. And there was another portion of brain on a plate, on a coffee table in the front room, next to a pair of amputated breasts.”
It later emerged that 81 pieces of Suzanne’s body were found in or by the nearby River Aire.
Suzanne turned out to be victim number three, after it emerged that he also killed Shelley Armitage, who had been reported missing a month earlier in April 2010. She had been shot with the crossbow and some of her cut up remains had been eaten.
Footage from the killer’s phone later showed Shelley’s body in his bathtub with the words “My sex slave” spray-painted on her back.
Susan Rushworth meanwhile had been killed with a hammer after she vanished in June 2009. Griffiths used machine tools to dismember her before eating some of her flesh. However, her remains were never found.
After being convicted 15 years ago, Griffiths, who is linked to the murders of three other women but has refused to cooperate with police, was given a whole life order, meaning he will never be freed.
Prison Life
Now, as he prepares for another Christmas behind bars, we take a look inside his troubled life in prisons so far.
Griffiths, a criminology PhD student who admired Yorkshire Ripper Peter Sutcliffe, has reportedly endured violent prison stints, and has repeatedly dodged death.
He even suffered “superficial wounds” after cutting himself in jail in 2010 before he was eventually convicted of the murders of three sex workers.
Following the “incident of self-harm”, a prison service spokesman said: “A prisoner at HMP Wakefield received superficial wounds after cutting himself with glass. He was treated in the healthcare centre of the prison after staff intervened.”
Another incident occurred in 2019, when an inmate tried to put a wood spear through the heart of Griffiths. He suffered a “large puncture wound” to his chest and lay screaming in pain before officers came to his rescue.
It happened inside HM Prison Long Lartin in Worcestershire before Griffiths was transferred.
More recently, in November 2024, he was supposedly “knocked unconscious” by a single punch. The perpetrator was reportedly a friend of murdered Suzanne Blamires.
A source said: “He was unhappy being on a wing with his friend’s killer. I don’t know how Griffiths came to know that he knew Suzanne. The inmate was worried he would be attacked himself.”
The triple killer, who is now in his mid 50s, was also said to have been battered on Valentine’s Day of this year. He allegedly hit out at another inmate inside HMP Full Sutton before the incident left him “too scared to leave his cell”.
A source told The Sun: “He was going round saying he wanted to kill someone. He started talking to another lag in his cell and all of a sudden tried to attack him.
“It turned into a fist fight. There were no weapons – the other inmate got the better of him and he was screaming ‘get off’.”
