Hammer killer gives thumbs-up to new life sentence for 'wicked' HMP Wakefield razor attack
A sadistic killer put his thumb up and nonchalantly said “cheers” to a judge who gave him a new life sentence for a sickening razor-blade attack on a prison officer.
Marty Bates, who is already serving a minimum 24-year-term life sentence for murdering a sleeping man with a hammer, attacked the officer with the makeshift weapon in the segregation unit at HMP Wakefield.
It has left the worker with a lengthy permanent scar running from his eye to his mouth.
Today at Leeds Crown Court, Judge Richard Mansell KC told 36-year-old Bates that he was a “highly dangerous man”.
He added: “This was a wicked offence. It was a premeditated and calculated attack on an officer simply doing his job, serving the public.
“It was a matter of pure chance you did not take his eye out and blind him for life.”
He gave Bates a new life sentence, for which he will serve a minimum of five years and four months. However, this will run consecutively to his existing life sentence.
Bates had been moved to the segregation unit at HMP Wakefield due to his behaviour behind bars. He had previously attacked officers at HMP Manchester, stabbing one repeatedly in the back.
On January 17 last year, four officers had gone to his cell in Wakefield to accompany him to the shower area. Bates was forced to hand over any items that could be used as weapons before they entered the cell.
He was in jovial mood, it was claimed, before the officers entered. But Bates’ mood changed swiftly and he lunged at the first, slashing him twice across the face with the razor wrapped in a cloth handle. The officer felt blood pouring from his face.
During the struggle that followed, Bates fractured another officer’s teeth with an aimed headbutt. He was eventually brought under control as other officers arrived to help.
The first officer was taken to hospital with two razor-slash wounds - 10cm and 4cm in length - that were “down to the bone”, having torn through muscle and cartilage. They required stitching before the wound itself could be closed.
In a victim impact statement, the officer said he has permanent scarring and was left housebound due to being self-conscious. The father-of-four is yet to return to work a year later and says when he does, he says it will be in a role that is “not prisoner facing”.
He said he was left devastated because it had been his “dream job”.
Bates, who has 14 previous convictions, admitted GBH with intent and ABH on the two officers at HMP Wakefield.
Mitigating, Daniel Lister said his guilty pleas were his best mitigation but added: “He was frustrated by what he perceived to be his mistreatment in custody. That’s the best explanation I can put forward on his behalf.”
Bates was jailed in 2021 for bludgeoning a man to death in his own bed with a hammer.
In July 2019, he went to the home of John Littlewood in Blackhall Colliery, near Hartlepool, let himself in and attacked him. It was heard the pair were friends and had been drinking together earlier in the day, but got into an argument.
Mr Littlewood was beaten so savagely that fragments of his skull became embedded in his brain.
Bates denied murder but confessed partway through his trial at Teesside Crown Court.