Samantha Bryan made her position clear after being approached by police in the days after Huntley died in hospital, the Daily Mirror reports. During a 30-minute meeting on March 17, officers explained that taking on the role could involve high financial costs, and she was contacted purely because she is his biological daughter. According to the Daily Mirror, Samantha Bryan refused outright, reiterating that she would not contribute financially, attend any service, or have any involvement in handling his ashes.
Ian Huntley, 52, died earlier this month after a brutal assault at HMP Frankland in Durham, a high-security prison housing some of the UK’s most dangerous offenders. He was savagely beaten and suffered fatal injuries at the end of February, and died on March 7 after being put in an induced coma. He was found in a pool of blood after being attacked with a metal bar, suffering devastating injuries including skull fractures, brain damage and a broken jaw, with the attack that ultimately led to his death believed to have been carried out by another inmate.
I want nothing to do with him.
In August 2002, Ian Huntley murdered ten-year-old best friends Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells at his home in Soham, Cambridgeshire. He was later sentenced to life imprisonment with a minimum term of 40 years. Throughout his time behind bars, he remained a target for other inmates due to the nature of his crimes, with incidents including being scalded with boiling water while held at HMP Wakefield in 2005 and hospitalised after suffering a serious throat wound inflicted with a makeshift weapon during another assault in 2010.
Samantha Bryan's firm stance means there is currently no immediate family member willing to take responsibility for his funeral, the Daily Mirror reports. She never met her father.
I had nothing to do with him in life and now I want nothing to do with him in death. I don’t want to pay for any funeral and I wouldn’t want to go to a funeral for him.