The life support machine for Soham killer Ian Huntley has been switched off, according to reports.
He had been in hospital since being attacked in HMP Frankland by another inmate while serving a life sentence for his murder of two 10-year-old girls in 2002, with him being described as 'fighting for his life'.
Recent reports said that Huntley, 52, had been rendered blind in the attack and suffered severe brain trauma, with him considered unlikely to survive his injuries.
Now the BBC reports that they understand they understand Huntley's life support has been switched off and he is close to death following the attack which left him lying in a pool of his own blood, with the machine being turned off yesterday (6 March).
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They also understand that convicted murderer and rapist Anthony Russell, 43, is suspected of carrying out the attack, he is in HMP Frankland after being sentenced to life in prison in 2021 for murdering a mother, her son and raping and killing a pregnant woman.
Huntley is said to have been repeatedly hit with a spiked metal pole in a prison workshop, with the alleged attacker yelling: "I’ve done it, I’ve done it. I’ve killed him, I’ve killed him."
Durham Constabulary have not identified the attacker, but have said a man in his mid 40s was detained.
The Soham killer had been attacked in prison before while serving his life sentence, as another inmate threw boiling water at him in 2005 and in 2010 he was slashed across the throat requiring 21 stitches.
Huntley was sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 40 years for murdering 10 year old girls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in August 2002.
The children went missing in Soham, Cambridgeshire, after they'd left a family barbecue to buy sweets and after an extensive search their bodies were found in a ditch in Lakenheath, Suffolk, two weeks later.
Huntley had been interviewed by the press before he became a suspect as he had been the last person to see the girls alive, and his then fiancée, Maxine Carr had been a teaching assistant at Holly and Jessica's school.
She gave Huntley a false alibi and was given three-and-a-half years for perverting the course of justice and given a new identity on release.
Carr was granted a lifelong anonymity order in 2005.
Huntley's daughter Samantha Bryan, 27, said she was 'glad' to hear her father had been attacked and left in a serious condition, telling The Sun her mother had called her to let her know about the attack.
She said: "I started crying because I thought he was dead - it was an overwhelming sense of relief, being his daughter has been a heavy burden.
"It felt like I could breathe again. I felt if he died, that burden died with him. There’s a special place in hell waiting for him."
Joe Harker