Soham killer Ian Huntley’s life-support machine has reportedly been switched off following the severe brain trauma he suffered in an attack at HMP Frankland, County Durham
Soham killer Ian Huntley has had at least three guards by his bedside at all hours, reports claim.
The former school caretaker, who murdered 10-year-olds Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in 2002, had been kept on life support in hospital after being hit repeatedly over the head by an inmate armed with a metal bar. However, it is understood this was switched off last night after brain tests showed he was in a vegetative state.
Unusually for the critical care unit at Newcastle’s Royal Victoria Infirmary, which allows no more than two visitors at a time, Huntley, 52, has had at least three guards by his bedside at all hours.
A high profile category A inmate such as Huntley requires three prison officers and a prison manager by his hospital bed guarding him at all times guarding him at all times, though it is likely just the guards remain as Huntley is in a coma. This means the presence is for his own protection rather than because he presents a flight risk.
READ MORE: Ian Huntley has life support ‘switched off’ and is ‘hours from death’READ MORE: ‘I was in same jail as Ian Huntley – monster who swaggers about wing will be next target’
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Staff are reportedly paid £24 an hour for the overtime, which is considered the “holy grail” by many prison officers. However, sources suggest the cost to the taxpayer for treating Huntley in a secure hospital, for that’s where he would go if the survives, could stretch to an eye-watering £300,000 a year – significantly more than the £85,000 it was costing to keep him locked up alongside the other murderers and sex offenders in HMP Frankland, County Durham.
The Daily Mail reports Huntley would never be safe with other inmates if he survived and returned to HMP Frankland. The source said: “He won’t be in a fit state to look after himself without round-the-clock care, plus he will never be safe from other inmates.”
But we reported last night the former school caretaker is now “effectively dead” after he was left lying in a pool of blood following a prison attack. He was rushed to the hospital last Thursday following the assault at HMP Frankland, which has been nicknamed “Monster Mansion” for housing a high number of murderers, rapists and terrorists.
READ MORE: Killer cop Wayne Couzens ‘petrified to leave cell’ after Ian Huntley prison attack
Huntley has been imprisoned there following his murders of 10-year-old girls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, whose bodies he dumped in a ditch near Soham, Cambridgeshire in 2002.
There are only three secure hospitals that can accept Category A prisoners; Broadmoor Hospital in Berkshire, Rampton in Nottinghamshire and Ashworth in Merseyside.
Ashworth, which sources say is the most likely destination for Huntley should he leave the Royal Victoria alive, will represent a stark departure from the horrors of Frankland, which is known as Monster Mansion.
