Former Lostprophets singer Ian Watkins died from a stab wound to the neck in HMP Wakefield, an inquest has heard. The coroner, Oliver Longstaff, said Watkins was pronounced dead on 11 October by an attending doctor and formally identified by a prison officer. Paramedics were called after reports he had been stabbed in the neck, and a post-mortem gave the cause of death as an incision to the neck.
Two men, Rashid Gedel, 25, and Samuel Dodsworth, 43, have been charged with murder in connection with the incident. They are on remand awaiting trial, provisionally set for 5 May, expected to last two to three weeks. The coroner has suspended his investigation pending the outcome of the criminal justice process.
Emergency services were called to the prison on the Saturday morning, and Watkins was pronounced dead at the scene. Two further men, aged 23 and 39, were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to murder, interviewed, and returned to prison.
Watkins was jailed in 2013 for 29 years with a further six years on licence after admitting to multiple sex offences, including attempting to rape an 11-month-old baby. He was initially arrested in September 2012 following a drugs warrant, during which computers and devices were seized. He had previously been stabbed in HMP Wakefield in 2023 and appeared in court in 2019 for possessing a phone behind bars.
