Moment prison officers find blade that inmates used to kill Lostprophets paedophile Ian Watkins is shown to jury

This is the moment prison officers found the makeshift knife allegedly used to kill pedophile Lostprophets frontman Ian Watkins at maximum security HMP Wakefield.

The disgraced singer, 48, suffered catastrophic blood loss after being slashed three times on her face and neck on October 11 last year; one wound had severed his larynx and left jugular vein.

Rico Gedel, 25, who is serving a life sentence for murder, admitted to killing Watkins but denies intending to kill her.

He told the court how he attacked Watkins and told him: ‘This is what pedophiles deserve’.

Sex offender Samuel Dodsworth, 44, also denies murder.

Prosecutors allege he acted as a lookout for Gedel and destroyed the gun after a 20-second attack at the Category A security prison.

Prosecutor Tom Storey KC told jurors that another inmate notified the prison officer that the gun had been thrown into a communal bin.

He said: ‘The only bins were in alcoves where Dodsworth had been seen entering and exiting and so the two officers began searching for them.

‘At the bottom of one of the bins they found what appeared to be a homemade knife with tape wrapped around it and what appeared to be blood on it.’

Gedel, who is serving a life sentence for murder, told jurors he stabbed Watkins in an attempt to move him to the isolation unit because he was “disgusted” by sharing the prison’s B Wing with sex offenders.

Detailing the attack with evidence, he told jurors: ‘There’s no easy way to say this.

‘I stabbed him in the neck and cut him. This wasn’t a poking move. It was a cutting motion.

‘I cut his throat. The blood did not come out immediately. That’s why I cut off his ear. But I didn’t think I caught his ear, I think I caught his cheek.

‘Then I think I grabbed his neck. So I cut him again and that’s when he started bleeding.’

When asked if he said anything to Watkins during the attack, Gedel replied: ‘This is what pedophiles deserve.’

‘I don’t think (Watkins) can talk. ‘It was like a mumbled cry for help.’

Gedel told jurors Thursday that the only guilt he felt was toward the pedophile’s victims.

He denies murder, saying he wanted to stop sharing a room with sex offenders in prison, so he decided to attack another inmate, but that he did not intend to kill.

Gedel claimed that his accomplice Dodsworth gave him a makeshift knife before the attack.

Richard Wright KC, defending Dodsworth, asked Gedel if he was ‘glad’ Watkins was dead.

The defendant replied: ‘A little’.

Mr Wright asked: ‘So you’re certainly not losing sleep over it, are you?’

Gedel said: ‘No, not really. What I’m saying is that the only guilt I’ll feel about this is what the victims feel.

‘I know from my own experience of friends and family being sexually assaulted, I don’t know if they would want it (Watkins’ death). But that’s my only fault.’

Mr Wright explained whether Gedel meant that Watkins’ victims wanted him to have a hard time in prison and that they would see “his death as an easy option”.

Gedel replied: ‘I felt a little guilty for them for not getting this opportunity.’

Jurors heard Gedel was convicted of murder in his early 20s, while he continued to deny it and was sentenced to at least 27 years in prison.

Mr Wright pointed out that Gedel had changed his statement of defense three times, including one he had completed only the day before, and questioned why he now claimed Dodsworth, a convicted rapist, had given him the knife.

Mr Wright said Gedel now said ‘because it was convenient and, frankly, quite entertaining’.

Gedel replied: ‘I got the knife from Dodsworth.’

Later the defendant told Tom Storey KC, prosecuting: ‘I don’t like fighting, in any fight there’s a chance I’ll lose and I don’t want to end up injured.

There are serial killers in ‘Wakefield’.

‘I am around such serious people, I know that the possibility for me could be death.’

Mr Storey played body-worn camera footage of guards holding Gedel in a cell while other officers tried to save Watkins’ life four minutes after the attack.

Gedel was seen smiling and saying: ‘I hope he falls asleep.’

Gedel told the court: ‘Part of me wanted him dead, part of me didn’t want him to die.

‘That was a bad mix.’

He explained why he smiled and said he also smiled during court hearings, saying: ‘Smiling is the only way I can mask my emotions in front of other people.’

While testifying, Dodsworth, who is serving a 24-year prison sentence for repeatedly raping a woman, denied having any knowledge of the attack on Watkins or acting as a lookout for Gedel.

He told jurors: ‘A murderer would not ask a sex offender to attack another sex offender.’

Dodsworth, 44, emphasized that he held no grudges against Watkins, who he said paid him with e-cigarettes to clean his cell.

He said of Watkins’ sexual offenses against children: ‘He did what he did, I did what I did. ‘I can’t fully judge him’.

Dodsworth agreed to dispose of the makeshift knife Gedel used to kill Watkins, but said he didn’t realize at first what it was or what it was used for.

He said: ‘When he handed it to me I shook my hand and felt something sharp.

‘I looked down to see what it was and put it straight into my pocket. I told him I didn’t want it because I didn’t want to get involved.

‘All I keep taking back is [from Gedel] It was “Get rid of him, get rid of him.”‘

He added: ‘When I realized what it was being used for at Watkins, I went to my cell, wrapped it in tissue paper and put it in the bin.’

The weapon, a Stanley knife-type knife wrapped in sellotape, was later seized by prison officers from a bin in a common area in B Wing.

On cross-examination, Dodsworth said he “panicked” and “threw” the knife because he “didn’t want anything to do with it”.

He said: ‘As soon as I was told to get out of it I decided I was going to tell a member of staff.’

Tom Storey, prosecuting, from KC, told Dodsworth: ‘You were helping [Gedel] He carried out the attack on Mr Watkins because he couldn’t have done it without your help, could he?’

Dodsworth replied: ‘As you wish. I don’t care if my attitude stinks right now, but deep down I know I’m not involved in murder.

‘I was busy getting rid of the evidence because I didn’t know anything else until it was given to me. Then when I saw Watkins’ neck I realized what it was used for.’

He added: ‘At the end of the day I am involved in a sexual offense myself. So I have to look over my shoulder because one day I’m going to be killed for what I’ve done.

‘Does this really scare me? Not really, because it will happen and you’ll have to deal with it. It’s just a fact of life.

‘But that doesn’t mean I have to kill another sex offender.’

Watkins, from Pontypridd, South Wales, was jailed in 2013 for a series of horrific sexual offenses against children, including the attempted rape of an 11-month-old baby.

He was pronounced dead at the prison entrance less than an hour after the attack at 9.19am.

Jurors were told his convictions for child sex offenses meant he was a constant target for other inmates; Some of these inmates believed that prison was ‘too good’ for them.

When Gedel was passed past Watkins’ open cell door while emergency treatment was ongoing, he was recorded saying to the camera: ‘Good night sleep, Watkins young man.’

Officers’ body cameras recorded Gedel being ‘calm’ four minutes after the attack, saying they would ‘never find’ the gun.

Gedel also appeared to find the situation ‘fun’ and was later described as ‘lively’ while under the watchful eye of prison guards, the court previously heard.

While he was being locked up and monitored by guards, he was also recorded as asking for a pen ‘so I could do my sudoku’.

He is also alleged to have told a police officer: ‘If I killed him, you might be talking to someone famous.’

Gedel initially refused to answer questions after his arrest, but later said he was jealous of the ‘one-time prisoners’ because they were treated ‘like royalty’, the court previously heard.

When asked who caused Watkins’ injury, Gedel replied, ‘God.’

The jury heard that Watkins received two threatening notes the day before his death, demanding £500 and warning his ‘head would crack’ if he did not pay.

The prosecution said the attack was “clearly a joint attack” as Dodsworth was aware the attack was about to take place.

The trial continues.