Latest news with #ChildKiller
Daily Mail
6 days ago
- Daily Mail
Soham killer Ian Huntley 'makes vile jibe about his 10-year-old victims' by wearing number 10 Man United-style shirt similar to the ones the two little girls he murdered were wearing when he attacked them
Child killer Ian Huntley has sparked fury by reportedly wearing a number 10 Manchester United-style shirt in an apparent vile taunt about his ten-year-old victims. The 51-year-old school caretaker murdered Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells at his home in Soham, Cambridgeshire, in August 2002, in a case that shocked Britain. They were both wearing matching red United football tops when they went missing after leaving a family barbecue to buy sweets. Huntley, who lured the girls into his house and murdered them before dumping their bodies in a ditch, is serving a life sentence at HMP Frankland, County Durham. A source told The Sun: 'He's been seen strutting about in the shirt as if it's funny. It is vile.' He was reportedly called a 'sick b****d' by fellow inmates for wearing the football top - but responded with a thumbs up. It is thought Huntley ordered the red number 10 shirt from Sports Direct, despite prisoners being barred from wearing tops of the football teams they support. The insider said: 'Huntley has made it as close to a Man U top as he can — and it is sick.' 'Everyone thinks he is doing it to satisfy his own sick mind, rather than for football reasons,' they added. Huntley reportedly started wearing the shirt earlier this year and has been seen in it walking to the gym and health centre. Inmates at HMP Frankland complained about the football-style shirt in May but nothing was done, according to The Sun's report. It is understood that because it is not an actual football shirt, Huntley has not broken any prison rules by wearing it. The move was criticised by Robert Jenrick who said Huntley should not be 'swanning around' in jail insulting the memory of his victims. The Tory shadow justice secretary said it should be 'ripped off his back' by prison guards. An image of both girls wearing matching Man Utd tops was one of the last haunting images of them before they went missing. They were later discovered by police burned and dumped in a bin. Despite being responsible for the murders, Huntley gave TV interviews and joined in searches while his then-girlfriend Maxine Carr gave him a false alibi. Carr even showed off an end-of-term card the girls had sent her, covered in loving comments and kisses. Huntley, meanwhile, repeatedly spoke of how he was the last person to see the girls before their apparent disappearance. He also helped organised community events to help the search effort. The truth was that Huntley had lured the girls into the home he shared with Carr, as they passed by. He has never fully revealed what took place there, but within an hour both girls were dead. Then he hid their bodies near RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, six miles away, and later returned to set fire to them. When he was in court, Huntley lamely claimed that both schoolgirls had died accidently. He said Holly drowned in his bath and that he inadvertently suffocated Jessica while trying to stifle her screams. But in 2018 he confessed to deliberately killing Jessica to stop her from raising the alarm. He continued to insist that Holly's death was an accident. Huntley was jailed for life in 2005. Carr was jailed for perverting the course of justice and was released in 2004 with a new identity.
Daily Mail
15-07-2025
- Daily Mail
Constance Marten's life behind bars as killer aristocrat 'befriends Sara Sharif's stepmother' and moaned about treatment in prison magazine cover star interview
Child killer Constance Marten became close to Sara Sharif 's murderer stepmother behind bars, it has been revealed. Aristocrat Marten, 38, was convicted yesterday alongside her violent lover Mark Gordon of causing their newborn Victoria's death after going on the run to prevent authorities taking the baby away. During her trial Marten was an inmate at HMP Bronzefield in Ashford, Surrey, where she reportedly became close to Beinash Batool - the stepmother of 10-year-old Sara who was tortured to death at home by her father and his wife in August 2023. The friendship developed despite Marten professing her love for children throughout her trial, and claiming she did everything she could to protect her own baby from harm. Over the years, Sara suffered an unimaginable ordeal at the hands of Batool and her father, who bound her arms and legs while they battered her with a cricket bat, metal pole and a rolling pin, strangled her until her neck broke, burnt her with an iron and bit her. The stepmother and her cellmate Marten once had the same legal representative, according to The Times. Marten, who is from an aristocratic family, made headlines within jail when she featured as the cover model for a magazine selling itself as 'for women with conviction'. Appearing on the cover of The View, Marten wore a glamorous dress and earrings in a shot said to have been taken at least 10 years ago. In an article written during her retrial, Marten set out some of her objections about prison life, becoming a notorious irritant for staff at the prison due to her constant complaints about jail conditions. In a bid to sway jurors midway through her prosecution, Marten's magazine interview was titled 'Surviving Serco', in which she claimed her trial was 'prejudiced' by the 'inhumane' conditions she endured behind bars. In an accompanying podcast which proclaimed, 'this is the very foundation of a fair trial being undermined', Marten bemoaned the long journeys to court in transport provided by private contractor Serco and 'disgusting' microwave meals in her 'stone-cold' Old Bailey cell. 'I'm being made to survive these 17 to 19-hour days with little or no rest, no food,' she said. Marten also breached a High Court anonymity order by providing photographs to the magazine, risking prosecution for contempt of court. It was one of the many extraordinary attempts she and her partner Gordon made to derail a prosecution which has cost taxpayers around £2.8million over two trials across the last two years. Over that period, the couple conspired to delay, lie and obfuscate, often failing to turn up to court, inventing fictitious ailments and disregarding the judge's orders, shouting across him and chatting in the dock as the evidence was outlined. For a special episode of the Mail's award-winning The Trial podcast breaking down the Constance Marten verdict, click here As a consequence, their first trial last year was scheduled to last six weeks but ended up taking six months – and concluded with jurors unable to agree verdicts. Then their retrial overran by more than a month as the pair continued to manipulate proceedings. At times, Marten was so rude to the Recorder of London, Judge Mark Lucraft, that he had to banish her to the cells. At one point she contemptuously said of his legal directions: 'Are they going to be better than last year? I've got very little respect for you.' The long-suffering judge declared that the defendants were behaving worse than two teenagers charged with murder with their continual 'antics' to 'deliberately sabotage the trial'. 'I've sat as a full-time judge now for 13 years and I've never had that sort of attitude by anybody,' he said.
