Paul/Keira Fitzgerald

Paul/Keira Fitzgerald, a convicted male sex offender who has reportedly identified as a trans woman named Keira, was convicted at Hull Crown Court in November 2020 of the murder of the predatory sex offender Richard Huckle. He was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum term of 34 years.

Fitzgerald, 30, had denied murdering Huckle in October 2019 saying his medical conditions (including mixed personality disorder, psychopathy and gender identity disorder) had impaired his ability to exercise self-control while both were serving long sentences for sex offences in the Category A men’s prison HMP Full Sutton in Yorkshire. However the CPS prosecuted him for the particularly violent prolonged torture, sexual assault and sadistic murder of Huckle.

Media reports said that Fitzgerald claimed he had wanted to kill others but was “having too much fun” with Huckle and had even contemplated cooking parts of his body, which he said “would be funny.” At sentencing Fitzgerald, laughed and smirked as the judge told him he was a “psychopath who derives pleasure from imagining torturing, raping, killing and even eating others”.

Fitzgerald was serving an IPP jail sentence for a 2009 attack on a woman as she walked her dog – he was charged with actual bodily harm, false imprisonment and a sex offence. Reportedly he boasted: “I love raping women.” He has previous convictions for multiple violent and sexual assaults, starting from the age of 13 and including. In January 2016, Fitzgerald tried to take a member of staff hostage and
threatened to stab her. He was later sentenced to an additional two years and four months in prison and transferred to the high security unit at HMP Woodhill, then later to HMP Full Sutton.

Hull Live reports that jurors were told Fitzgerald was a risk to females and at risk of hostage taking, and a senior nurse at the prison said: “Staff were not allowed to deal with him on a one-to-one basis.”

*Update 15 May 2024*

The Independent Prison Ombudsman Report into Richard Huckle’s death was published on 15 May 2024 and highlighted that security intelligence reports indicating Fitzgerald’s escalating risk were not
analysed on time, and recommended actions (including referral to the mental health team) were not completed. The report also details the severe risk that Fitzgerald poses to female staff and other prisoners and his violent sexual fantasies about hurting and humiliating women, psychopathic traits and constant thoughts of murder, rape, cannibalism, mutilation, necrophilia and torture, in particular a desire to mutilate a female officer.

Link to report here