The Soham murderer Ian Huntley has been seriously injured in a prison attack in County Durham.

A prisoner, understood to be Huntley, who was convicted of killing two 10-year-old girls, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in 2002, was taken to hospital after being assaulted on Thursday morning at HMP Frankland, Durham constabulary said.

It is thought Huntley was knocked unconscious with a metal pole, according to the Sun, which first reported the attack, with a source reportedly telling the paper his condition was “touch and go”.

A spokesperson for Durham constabulary said: “Police were alerted to an assault which had taken place within HMP Frankland in Durham this morning. A male prisoner suffered serious injuries during the incident and was transported to hospital.

“A police investigation is now under way into the circumstances of the incident and detectives are liaising with staff at the prison.”

A North East ambulance service spokesperson said: “We received a call at 9.23am on Thursday 26 February 2026 to reports of an incident at HM Prison Frankland in County Durham.

“We dispatched two ambulance crews to the scene and requested support from the Great North air ambulance service. One patient was transported to hospital by road.”

Huntley killed the girls after they left a family barbecue to buy sweets in Soham, Cambridgeshire, on 4 August 2002, then dumped their bodies in a ditch.

Holly and Jessica, who were school friends, were missing for 13 days during a search that became one of the most intensive in British criminal history. A total of 400 police officers were assigned full-time to the case, with investigators questioning every registered sex offender in Cambridgeshire and neighbouring Lincolnshire.

Huntley, a caretaker at the school the girls attended, became a suspect after claiming to have had a conversation with them shortly after they were last seen. His agitated demeanour, and questions about the length of time that DNA evidence would last, caused police officers to become suspicious.

Initially, the killer was given an alibi by his then partner, Maxine Carr, a teaching assistant the girls knew, but this broke down under police questioning. He was later arrested when officers found at his workplace charred pieces of the Manchester United shirts the girls had been wearing when they disappeared and other evidence connecting him to the crime.

He is serving a life sentence for their murders, while Carr served half of a 42-month sentence for perverting the course of justice.

A Prison Service spokesperson said: “A prisoner is receiving treatment after an incident at HMP Frankland on Thursday morning. It would be inappropriate to comment further while police investigate.”

HMP Frankland is a category A prison, meaning it has the highest level of security, and houses a number of high-profile inmates, including Michael Adebolajo, one of the two men convicted of murdering Lee Rigby; the serial killer Levi Bellfield; and Wayne Couzens, the murderer of Sarah Everard.

Violent attacks at the prison are not uncommon. In April last year, three prison officers were taken to hospital with life-threatening injuries including burns and stab wounds after being attacked with hot cooking oil and homemade weapons by an inmate, Hashem Abedi, the brother of the Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi.