"Essex Boys" murderer sues over prison attack

Steele was jailed in 1998 for the murder of three men in a Range Rover parked at Rettendon in Essex Credit: PA Wire

A triple murderer who was battered unconscious when he was attacked in a high-security prison is suing the Ministry of Justice for £100,000 for not protecting him from violent Muslim inmates.

Michael Steele - one of the "Essex Boys" killers jailed in 1998 - was beaten with a steel pot in a kitchen after an argument over use of a telephone in 2010.

Steele, now 73, suffered a bad cut, damaged teeth and a fractured eye socket in the assault at maximum security HMP Whitemoor, near Peterborough.

Steele claims he was told by senior staff that Muslim "gangs" in the prison are "impossible to control or discipline" due to their numbers.

Assaults, sometimes involving sugar-laden hot water or sharpened toothbrushes, are frequent and often due to objections about the cooking of pork in prison kitchens, he claims.

Although he made a good recovery from the attack, he is now suing the government for damages for failing to protect him.

Michael Steele was jailed in 1998 for Rettendon murders Credit: Essex Police

In a hearing, Ministry of Justice lawyers tried to "strike out" Steele's claim, but the case will go ahead after District Judge Ian Avent said it is arguable.

"Mr Steele's claim is predicated on the basis that Muslim prisoners were a violent threat and that the prison was the most volatile of the high security dispersal prisons," said the judge.

The court heard Steele had rowed with a Muslim prisoner - referred to only as Miller - in January 2010 after being accused of jumping the queue to use a telephone.

The following day he was in a kitchen cooking his dinner when he was hit on the head from behind with what is believed to have been a metal pot.

In his evidence, he said: "At the same instance, the prisoner Miller sprang forward, striking me to the left side of my face.

"That further assisted my inevitable fall to the ground, where Miller and possibly one other kicked me unconscious."

Prison officers used paper towels to stem the flow of blood, before sending him to Peterborough Hospital.

Police searching remote lane in Rettendon, Essex off the A130 between Chelmsford and Southend, where a Range Rover was found with three bodies inside. Credit: PA Wire

Steele claims prison bosses should have done more to protect him from the attack.

"His allegation is that the senior management of the prison were negligent because they employed inappropriate staffing levels that encouraged, and gave opportunity for, frequent levels of violence on vulnerable prisoners," said the judge.

The Ministry of Justice argued the claim had no chance of succeeding. Staff had no reason to suspect Steele was at risk of an attack, lawyers said.

But after a Central London County Court hearing, Judge Avent said the claim would be allowed to go ahead to a full trial.

Authorities at the prison knew that the kitchen was not covered by CCTV cameras, he said.

"They would also have known that the kitchens would have contained any number of potentially deadly instruments," he continued.

Steele was jailed for life for the 1996 gangland killings which became known as the Rettendon Range Rover Murders. The murders inspired the 2000 movie "Essex Boys", starring Sean Bean.