The daughter of Soham killer Ian Huntley has said she is 'glad' her father was savagely beaten in prison, adding that 'there is a special place in hell waiting for him'. Samantha Bryan, 27, said she cried from relief when she learned of the attack, initially believing it meant he was dead.
Huntley, 52, was attacked by a fellow inmate at a recycling workshop at HMP Frankland in County Durham on Thursday morning. He remains in hospital on life support in a medically induced coma. The convicted murderer killed ten-year-old girls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman in 2002.
Ms Bryan, Huntley's only child, told The Sun on Sunday: 'Being his daughter has been a heavy burden. It felt like I could breathe again.' She only discovered he was her father during a school project on crime aged 14, when she came across a blurry picture of her mother with him online. Her mother Katie Bryan, 45, was in a relationship with Huntley aged 15 and became pregnant at 16, before fleeing to escape his abuse.
Ms Bryan said: 'I think he got what he deserves. I hope he burns in hell. I'd like to shake the hand of the man who did it.' She had written to Huntley multiple times from 2019 onwards, asking to meet, but he repeatedly denied her request. In a 2024 letter, he said he doubted there would be 'enough time for a significant shift in circumstances' for them to meet.
Although relieved she will never meet him, Ms Bryan is angry and sad she will never get the answers she craved for Holly and Jessica's families. Her mother alleged Huntley raped, abused and degraded her during their underage relationship, which Huntley denied in his letter. The news of the attack came to Ms Bryan's mother via a family friend, leaving her sick to her stomach.
