Ian Watkins the paedophile former frontman of the Lostprophets band has been stabbed to death in prison. Watkins who was serving a 29 year gaol term imposed in 2013 was stabbed on the morning of 11th October.
He had been gaoled for some of the worst crimes against children that I’ve come across in Britain in recent decades and had encouraged others who were dazzled by his then fame to also engage in child abuse and share the videos with him. Ian Watkins was a monster but he was a monster who could have quite easily slipped the net. South Wales Police grossly and incompetently mishandled reports from 2008 onwards from numerous complainants of Watkins’s child sexual exploitation activities. This failure to even do basic investigations regarding these earlier reports by South Wales Police had the effect of leaving Watkins free to abuse more victims. His history of child abuse and consumption of child sex abuse material only came to light when Watkins’s home was raided by police on a drugs warrant. The search of the home of Watkins uncovered his collection of child abuse materials and this spurred the investigation that led to the gaoling of Watkins. It’s a horrible and worrying thought that because of the incompetence of South Wales Police it was only by Watkins being so indiscreet and out of control with regards to drugs that he was eventually caught. But for the drugs raid his disgraceful proclivities might never have come to light.
If there is anything that surprises me about this story is that it took so long for some other prisoner, maybe one serving the sort of sentence that leaves them nothing to lose, to take out Watkins. Being such a high profile nonce Watkins must have been on a lot of other prisoners priority target list. Watkins had already been attacked several times since starting his sentence and an ending of his life in this manner was always going to be on the cards.
I feel no pity for Watkins. He was the architect of his own destruction. Nothing of value has been lost by his passing. I do however feel sorry for his victims of which there may be many more than came to light at his trial. They are going to be always afflicted in some way either mentally or physically by what Watkins did to them.
Ian Watkins was a destroyer. He destroyed the lives of his victims, his band and everyone around him. He also ultimately destroyed himself by his own actions. He might have been stabbed to death by an assailant but his own choices put him in the position where that happened.
There’s going to be other ripples that go out from the killing of Ian Watkins. It’s going to focus attention on HMP Wakefield, which houses many of Britain’s more notorious and violent prisoners and attention to how security is managed there. Whilst many of us are pleased to see the back of Watkins there’s also the matter of a prison losing via violence a high profile prisoner. There’s going to be a lot of questions asked about whether alleged shortages of staff or other management failings had an influence on creating the on wing situation that produced the opportunity for Watkins to be stabbed. Any inquiry into this incident may uncover much that is terribly wrong with Britain’s prison system with regards safety and security in prisons, staff numbers and morale and how it is managed. It’s also the sort of inquiry, like that of the Grooming Gangs Inquiry, that the current government might not want to hold for fear of what it might reveal.
Many years ago I got to see through working in courts, some of the worst of the worst being sent to gaol and for all sorts of offences. Many of them deserved their sentences for being thieves, robbers, fraudsters, thugs, terrorists, rapists or nonces. Were some of those individuals redeemable, almost certainly, especially the robbers, thieves and fraudsters, some of them from what I can gather went on to lead as much of a normal life as they could after release.
However there were some who I considered to be irredeemable such as the PIE men, the guy who bit his baby to death and the far too numerous serial rapists and serial nonces. Ian Watkins was one of those prisoners who I would consider to be more or less irredeemable. There was no way was this guy going anywhere but deeper into his wrongness.
Some of the prison tittle tattle that I’ve seen around paints a picture of Watkins being arrogant, boastful and unwilling to follow prison rules. Someone like that rarely turns themselves around.
There are few cures for the sickness that Watkins manifested and zero reasons or excuses. He did not fall into bad company or get greedy or get over enthusiastic with the recreational violence at football or fall prey to the sort of drug or alcohol addiction that clouded his judgement or want material things and influence over others, as was the case with the backstories of what I call many of the regular criminals. Watkins had every opportunity to not do what he did. There was nothing or nobody forcing him to become a monster, he did that and he chose that for himself. He saw the path of the evil inclination and it led him to his death and the destruction and damage of a great many of those around him.
Goodbye and good riddance to Ian Watkins.