A CONVICTED murderer who may have struck in Huddersfield while on the run from prison is dead.

Lee Dewhurst was recaptured after failing to return to an open prison where he was serving a life sentence for killing a gay singer.

Dewhurst, 35, from Rochdale in Greater Manchester, was found hanging by officers at Bristol prison at around 2pm on Sunday.

Staff attempted to resuscitate him before he was taken to the city's Southmead Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

A nationwide police hunt was launched for Mr Dewhurst after he failed to return to Prescoed open prison in South Wales on July 11.

He was allowed out as part of his rehabilitation programme.

He was eventually arrested in Jersey last month and brought back to Wales by officers from Gwent Police.

When he was on the run, police in West Yorkshire were hunting him after believing he may have attended gay events here.

He emerged as a suspect after a man was robbed in Huddersfield.

Police also wanted to speak to him about two further robberies - one in Calderdale and the other in York.

All the offences were thought to have been committed on members of the gay community in July and there had been sightings of Dewhurst at gay community events in Huddersfield and Halifax that month.

In the Huddersfield robbery the suspect met a man on Albion Street in Huddersfield town centre and the pair walked down Queen Street South where the robbery happened in a quiet area close to Huddersfield Narrow Canal.

It is not known how far the investigation into the July offences had gone before Dewhurst's death.

Dewhurst was jailed for life at Liverpool Crown Court in 1992 for killing Stephen O'Hara in his Rochdale flat, battering him to death with a monkey wrench.

He wrapped the body in carpet and burned the victim's clothes.

A Prison Service spokesman said: "We can confirm the death in custody of Lee Dewhurst.

"Mr Dewhurst was found hanging in his cell at HMP Bristol at 2pm on October 1, 2006.

"Staff attempted to resuscitate Mr Dewhurst and he was taken to Southmead hospital in Bristol where he was pronounced dead at 3.11pm.

"The Prisons and Probation Ombudsman will investigate the death as with all deaths in custody."