Known as a modern day ‘Jekyll and Hyde’, Suffolk Strangler Steve Wright has been handed another life sentence on top of the one he’s already serving – and his life inside will shock you
12:30, 07 Feb 2026Updated 12:40, 07 Feb 2026
Steve Wright was handed a second consecutive life sentence this week for the abduction and murder of Victoria Hall(Image: PA)
A remorseless “woman hating” serial killer could face fresh prison attacks from repulsed inmates after his latest confession.
Terror enfulged the streets of Ipswich in 2006 when five women were murdered in a spate of attacks, with their bodies scattered across different locations in the town. Two years later, forklift driver Steve Wright was jailed over the killings. But horrifyingly, he kept the true extent of his crimes a secret – until now.
Wright was handed a life sentence in 2008 for the murders of Gemma Adams, 25, Tania Nicol, 19, Anneli Alderton, 24, Paula Clennell, 24, and Annette Nicholls, 29. All of the women were sex workers. The killer, once described as “perverted, nervous and quiet”, had always refused to acknowledge any responsibility for his crimes. But on Monday, he admitted to the kidnapping and murdering another victim – 17-year-old Victoria Hall. He also admitted the attempted kidnap Emily Doherty, 22 the night before Victoria’s disappearance.
Wright murdered Victoria in 1999, meaning her family were left without answers for 26 agonising years. His admission will provide some closure for the teen’a family, but it was too late for Victoria’s mother, who tragically died just before Christmas.
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The killer was emotionless in court(Image: PA)
On Friday, Wright was sentenced to 40 more years in prison for the murder and attempted kidnap. He had been due to go on trial at the Old Bailey but changed his plea at the final hour this week. It’s the sixth murder for which he has been convicted – but the first to which he has actually admitted. The judge, Mr Justice Bennathan, told Wright he will die in prison.
The night she was murdered, Victoria had had a drink and a dance with her friend, Gemma Algar, at the Bandbox nightclub in Felixstowe, before they both walked home at 1am. “They parted company quite close to their homes and that’s the last time anyone – apart from you – saw Victoria Hall alive,” the judge told Wright.
“He did not allow Victoria Hall, aged 17, to escape his predatory clutches,” prosecutor Jocelyn Ledward KC said. “Having separated from her best friend, Gemma Algar, only 300 metres from her front door, she never made it home and seemingly vanished; the only clue to what happened to her, a scream in the night on the small housing estate where she lived in the village of Trimley St Mary – not 2 miles from where the defendant made his attempt on Emily Doherty.
Victoria Hall was murdered by Steve Wright(Image: PA)
“But Victoria had not simply vanished into thin air. The defendant had abducted and, within a very short time, murdered her – as well as sexually violating her in some way.” He then “callously discarded her body, stripped naked of everything except for her jewellery”, in a farm ditch 25 miles away, “as if she were no more important than a disposable commodity”, the court heard.
Wright showed no emotion in court, even as Victoria’s brother, Steven – who also spoke on behalf of his father, Graham – cried while detailing how his crimes had destroyed their family.
But what will his life in prison look like now after admitting to yet another heinous crime? The killer was being held at HMP Long Lartin, Worcs – and is reportedly set to return. Speaking to the Mirror, former Met police officer Nusrit Mehtab said the predator will likely face a fresh wave of attacks behind bars. “There’s more risk of an attack inside the prison,” she says. “He’s got the legacy for being the most notorious, infamous serial killer. That wears off over time, so this new trial has brought it back to the attention of fellow prisoners.”
Nusrit says she hopes the killer “never sees the light of day”. Of his change in plea, she explained: “There’s some form of psychological relief for saying ‘yes I did it’. He probably reached a point of living with the mental toll that it became unbearable to him and it became closure for him. There was no escape route so he just came forward.”
Wright dumped Victoria’s body close to a farm(Image: PA)
“We could say it’s a strategic move to avoid further public scrutiny. By pleading guilty, he side stepped a spectacle of a high profile trial that could further damage his responsibility and more public condemnation.”
Wright has already experienced grim threats inside after becoming a target for fellow lags. In 2023, aged 64, he was reportedly punched in the face during an attack and suffered facial injuries. According to the Sun, a source said: “Wright might have a terrifying reputation outside of prison, but inside he’s hated as he is a sex offender. He annoyed someone and they took their chance to dish out some retribution.”
But the serial killer is said to enjoy some astonishing perks in prison, too. The same publication reports that Wright is on a ‘cushty’ regime in prison where inmates can learn to be barbers or baristas inside and enjoy music workshops.
He is said to get £33 a week for the canteen as well as a Freeview TV and DVD player, despite keeping the murder of Victoria Hall a secret for decades. The killer also apparently gets “increased” acccess to gyms and workshops.
A source told The Sun: “It seems wrong that he is getting these extra perks funded by the taxpayer when he has taken 27 years to admit to Victoria’s murder – and put families through the ordeal of the first trial. He is having a pretty cushy time and there are loads of activities he can get involved in.
Prosecutors said in court that Wright had acted like “a predator” who “stalked his prey” as he looked for a “young woman to kill”. And his life before the killings revealed clues on how he viewed women.
As a teenager, Wright joined the merchant navy and developed a reputation as a ‘ladies man’ who was rarely without a girlfriend. At the age of just 20 he married his first wife in Milford Haven, and had a son with her before their short marriage came to an end. He then went back to sea, working on the QE2 where, he admitted in court, he first acquired his taste for prostitutes, visiting massage parlours in various ports whenever he “got the urge”.
The killer is said to enjoy some perks in prison(Image: Suffolk Police / SWNS)
But his “urges” were never something he’d tell his wives and girlfriends. When he married again in 1987 and took over the Ferry Boat Inn in the heart of Norwich’s red light district, he was well known to the local prostitutes, most of who were afraid to have sex with him because of his ‘weird‘ behaviour, according to The Telegraph. Some knew him as “the soldier” because he wore camouflage trousers. Others described how he would cruise the streets dressed in high heels, PVC skirts and a wig.
Ipswich was thrust into the spotlight after Wright’s arrest in 2006, and during an intense police investigation, detectives established that the then- 48-year-old had moved into his Ipswich home just months before the killing spree started.
The naked bodies of the women, who all worked as prostitutes in the local area, were found in isolated locations near the Suffolk town in December 2006. Evidence showed all the women had been choked or strangled. Wright, who lived in Ipswich, denied any involvement in the women’s deaths but a jury took less than eight hours to find him guilty.
As he was serving a life sentence in prison after being convicted in 2008 of murdering the five women between October and December of 2006, police reopened the cold case of Victoria Hall’s murder. Wright was first arrested as part of the investigation in July 2021, and was rearrested in December 2023 and subsequently charged in May 2024.
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