Robert Maudsley, known as “Hannibal the Cannibal,” has been held in extreme solitary confinement.
Robert Maudsley, 70, has been held in solitary confinement at Wakefield Prison for the past 45 years due to the extreme danger he poses to other inmates, according to a report by the Manchester Evening News. Originally sentenced for murder, Maudsley went on to kill three more people while incarcerated.
New details about Maudsley’s extreme confinement are emerging from the book “Inside Wakefield Prison: Life Behind Bars in the Monster Mansion” by authors Jonathan Levi and Emma French. The book describes conditions mirroring those of the fictional serial killer Hannibal Lecter, with Maudsley reportedly kept in a specially designed transparent cell.
The writers detail: “Today, in Wakefield Prison, Maudsley is kept in confinement for twenty-three hours of the day. Everything in his cell is made of cardboard, and you have to go through 17 steel doors to get to it.”
As per the news outlet, his confinement closely mirrors Hannibal Lecter, played by Anthony Hopkins in the film Silence of the Lambs, which has led to Maudsley being dubbed “Hannibal the Cannibal.” The authors spoke to a prison insider named Pete, who gave more insights about the infamous “strongbox” in which he resides.
Pete remarked on Maudsley’s harsh reality, asserting: “The sad thing is, if he were living with someone else, he’d kill somebody else. It’d have been more humane to just put him down.”
As per the news report, he was unequivocal in his belief that Maudsley would kill again if released. Levi and French delved into the myth of the “Perspex Cell,” noting that “every contributor tells a different story”.
“Pete, for example, described the box in the following terms: ‘Metal with thick Perspex around them that looked out into the middle, and there was a metal door with thick Perspex on it and then an outer cell door,” they said.