LONDON, Dec. 24 (UPI) -- The British killer known as the Crossbow Cannibal is close to death after three weeks on hunger strike, a British newspaper reported.
Citing a source identified only as an "insider," The Sun said Stephen Griffiths -- convicted of killing three prostitutes and eating parts of their bodies -- is being held in a segregation cell at Wakefield Prison in Yorkshire. Griffiths has lost almost 50 pounds in three weeks and stopped drinking liquids Tuesday, the day he entered a guilty plea to three murders and received a life sentence, the newspaper said.
"If nothing is done and he keeps refusing fluids he could be dead by the end of the Christmas period," the source said.
After his arrest in May, Griffiths gave his name during a court appearance as "Crossbow Cannibal." Police are trying to determine whether he killed other young women who have disappeared in recent years in the Bradford area.
Griffiths wants to be held with ordinary inmates but was placed in segregation after four suicide attempts -- and recently swallowed several batteries to show that prison officials could not stop him from taking his own life, the newspaper said.
The Prison Service said inmates who understand what they are doing can go on hunger strike and refuse forced feeding.
Griffiths turned 41 Friday.
