Ian Huntley
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Ian Kevin Huntley (born 31 January 1974 in Grimsby, England) is a former school caretaker, who in 2003 was convicted of murdering two schoolgirls - Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman - in the case known as the Soham murders.
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[edit] Early life
Huntley was born in Grimsby on 31 January 1974, the first son of Kevin and Linda Huntley. When he started secondary school in September 1985 he was a target of bullying. By the time he reached 13 the problem had escalated to such an extent that he was transferred to a different school. He left school in the summer of 1990 with 5 A-C grades in his GCSEs but decided to go into employment selling tools rather than study for A-levels.
Throughout the 1990s Huntley worked at various unskilled, low-salary jobs. He was also investigated by the police on at least ten occasions for rape, underage sex, indecent assault and burglary. One rape and one burglary resulted in criminal charges but in both cases the charges were dropped by the Crown Prosecution Service because it was decided that there was not enough evidence. In October 1993, he was convicted of riding an unlicenced and uninsured motorcycle and received a £250 fine. In March 1996 he was convicted of watching TV without a licence and was again fined.
His parents Kevin and Linda separated in the early 1990s and Linda later had a lesbian relationship, but the couple are now living together again. Huntley has a brother called Wayne, who was born on 16 August 1975. He is married to Claire Evans (born 1976). Ian himself also married Claire, three days before his 21st birthday in 1995, but they separated not long after and Claire started a relationship with Wayne. Not surprisingly, this caused a bitter rift between the brothers. Ian Huntley refused to grant Claire a divorce until January 1999. Wayne married his brother's ex-wife in July 2000. Ian Huntley wasn't present[citation needed].
[edit] Soham murders
[edit] Beginnings
In February 1999, Huntley met 22-year-old Maxine Carr at Hollywood's nightclub in Grimsby. They shared a flat together in Barton-upon-Humber. Carr found a job packing fish at the local fish processing factory while Huntley worked as a barman. He also travelled to Cambridgeshire on his days off to help his father who worked as a school caretaker in the village of Littleport near Ely. He enjoyed the work so much that in September 2001 he applied for the position of caretaker at Soham Village College, a secondary school in a small town between Cambridge and Ely, after the previous caretaker was sacked for having an inappropriate relationship with a pupil.
Huntley was accepted for the post of caretaker at Soham Village College and he began work on 26 November 2001.
[edit] The murders
On 4 August 2002, at around 6 p.m., two 10-year-old girls, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, walked past Huntley's rented house in College Close. Huntley asked them to come into the house. He said that Carr was in the house as well, since she was a learning support assistant at St Andrew's Primary, the girls' school, and had got along well with them, although in fact she had gone to visit family back in Grimsby. Shortly after Holly and Jessica entered 5 College Close, Huntley murdered them.
His reasons for committing the murders may never be known, but minutes before seeing the girls Huntley had slammed the telephone down on Carr after a furious argument, as he was suspicious that she was cheating on him. The police believe that Huntley killed the girls in a jealous rage. There may have also been a sexual motive. It seems likely that either, or possibly both, of these motives drove Huntley to kill the girls. The police found no evidence of preplanning, and later said that they would have expected to find it if it was there.
[edit] Police investigation
Regardless of how the girls died, Huntley disposed of their bodies in a ditch 20 miles away and set them alight in a bid to destroy the forensic evidence. The search for the girls was one of the most highly publicised missing person searches in British history and Huntley even appeared on the BBC's Look East regional news programme speaking of the shock of the local community. They were found 13 days later near the perimeter fence of RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk, on 17 August 2002, twelve hours after their clothing was discovered in the grounds of Soham Village College and Huntley had been arrested. He was later charged with two counts of murder and detained under Section 48 of the Mental Health Act 1983, at Rampton Hospital, before a judge decided that he was fit to stand trial.
[edit] Mental Assessment
Ian Huntley's mental state was then assessed to see whether he suffered from mental illness and whether he was fit to stand trial. This assessment took place at Rampton Secure Hospital and was carried out by chief consultant forensic psychiatrist Dr Christopher Clark.
Dr Clark stated in court that "Although Mr Huntley made clear attempts to appear insane, I have no doubt that the man currently, and at the time of the murder, was both physically and mentally sound and therefore, if he is found guilty, carried out the murder totally aware of his actions".
This piece of evidence made it impossible for Huntley to escape a life sentence.
[edit] Huntley's trial
Huntley's trial opened at the Old Bailey on 5 November 2003. He was faced with two murder charges, while Carr was charged with perverting the course of justice and assisting an offender. Huntley admitted that the girls had died in his house, but claimed that he had accidentally knocked Holly into the bath while helping her control a nosebleed and had accidentally suffocated Jessica when she started to scream. However, the jury rejected his claims that the girls had died accidentally and on 17 December 2003 returned a majority verdict of guilty on both charges. Huntley was sentenced to life imprisonment, with his minimum term to be decided by the Lord Chief Justice at a later date. Carr was cleared of assisting an offender but found guilty of perverting the course of justice and jailed for three and a half years, but she was freed under police protection after just 5 months because she had already spent 16 months on remand. She was provided with a new identity and lives under police protection.
After Huntley was convicted, it was revealed that he had been investigated in the past for sexual offences and burglary but had still been allowed to work in a school. Home Secretary David Blunkett ordered an inquiry into these failings, chaired by Sir Michael Bichard, and later ordered the suspension of David Westwood, Chief of Humberside Police. The inquiry criticised Humberside Police for deleting information relating to previous allegations against Huntley and criticised Cambridgeshire Police for not following vetting guidelines. An added complication in the vetting procedures was the fact that Huntley had applied for the caretaker's job under the name of Ian Nixon. It is believed that Humberside Police either did not check under the name Huntley on the police computer - if they had then they would have discovered a burglary charge left on file - or did not check at all.
Since being jailed, Huntley has repeatedly admitted that he lied when giving evidence at his trial. He changed his story about the death of Jessica, having previously admitted to suffocating her in a panic. An audio tape recording of Huntley speaking to a relative at Wakefield Prison revealed that he allegedly killed her when she tried to call for help on her mobile phone.
On 29 September 2005, High Court Judge Mr Justice Moses, who presided over Huntley's original trial, ruled that he should spend 40 years in prison before he can be considered for parole. He was not issued with a whole life tariff because the judge said there was no evidence of abduction of the two girls. The beginning of his sentence was backdated to October 2002, when he was first remanded in custody — not August 2002, as he was initially held in a mental hospital before a judge decided he was fit to stand trial.
Under this ruling, Huntley is expected to remain behind bars until at least October 2042 and the age of 68.
The families of Huntley's victims later revealed that they had been hoping for a whole life tariff to be set, but Huntley's sentence was approximately three times heavier than the minimum terms imposed on most convicted murderers.
The Wells and Chapman families received £11,000 in compensation for the murder of their daughters[citation needed].
On 14 September 2005 Huntley was scalded with boiling water when another inmate attacked him[1]. A prison service spokesman said that due to the nature of high-security prisoners, "it's impossible to prevent incidents of this nature occasionally happening", but Huntley alleged that the prison authorities failed in their duty of care towards him, and launched a claim for £15,000 compensation. Huntley was reportedly awarded £2,500 in legal aid to pursue this claim, a move strongly criticised by the Soham MP, Jim Paice, who insisted on tight restrictions on the use of public money for compensation, and said, "The people I represent have no sympathy for him at all". Huntley's injuries meant that he did not attend the hearing at which his minimum term was decided.
On 5 September 2006, Huntley was found unconscious in his prison cell, thought to have taken an overdose. He had previously taken an overdose of anti-depressants while awaiting his trial. [2]. He was under police guard in hospital until 7 September, whereupon he was taken back to his prison cell under police escort, prompting much reaction from many present at the scene as well as making the front pages of many of the UK papers the next morning. Following this attempted suicide his cell was cleared and a tape was found which was marked with Queen on one side and Meat Loaf on the other. This tape is thought to contain confessions from Ian Huntley on what he did and how he did it. It is believed that Huntley made the tape in return for anti-depressants from a fellow prisoner, who hoped to obtain and later sell the confession to the media upon his release[3]. Aaron Nicholls is the prime suspect for providing Ian Huntley with antidepressants for his September 2006 suicide attempt. [1][2]
