Two killers are facing a potential further life sentence each for a planned attack on a fellow inmate lured into a prison cell.

Peter Christian Brown, a triple killer, and Brian Townsend, who is also serving a life sentence for murder, carried out the attack on the lone inmate at top security Frankland Prison, Durham, using a craft knife and shoe lace ligature.

Durham Crown Court heard that the victim, who desperately tried to fend off his attackers, suffered cuts to his neck, head, face and back, and required treatment at an external hospital, following the incident on December 31, last year.

Martin Towers, prosecuting, said the victim had just returned to his own cell, but was invited by Townsend into his adjacent cell.

Read more: HMP Frankland: Nine of the most notorious prisoners in Britain

Mr Towers said the inmate became immediately concerned on entering as a blanket was covering the bed and Brown was standing in the doorway.

He said at this point Townsend, who had a shoe lace, used it as a ligature, putting it to the complainant’s neck, but he managed to get his hand in to try to prevent it being tightened.

Brown, who had a craft knife, tried to stab the other inmate several times, with one of the blows aimed at the neck, as he was “egged” on by Townsend, who was shouting: “Get him.”

Mr Towers said it became a “frenzied attack” with further blows struck until a member of prison staff, alerted by the noise, arrived at the cell to break-up the assault.

The injured inmate was treated with a number of stitches to the wounds inflicted by his assailants.

“It was a joint offence and a planned offence with an attempt at strangulation,” added Mr Towers, which he said was aggravated by the defendants’ antecedent history for murder.

Both 55-year-old Brown, and his 39-year-old accomplice admitted charges of wounding with intent and unauthorised possession of a weapon in a prison.

The court heard Brown’s previous three murders, include one dating from 1996 on a fellow inmate at Parkhurst Prison, on the Isle of Wight, plus two within six days Nottinghamshire, in 2010.

Townsend’s murder offence was the joint killing of a fellow squatter who was doused in petrol and set alight in a disused nightclub, in Norwich, in 2006.

Read more: HMP Frankland prisoner hours-long stand off - in pictures

Oliver Connor, for Brown, said he has accepted his culpability for the latest offence throughout proceedings.

Mr Connor said Brown has stated previously that he carried out the attack as he believed the victim had laced his food with a drug.

He added that the defendant has since been transferred from Frankland to Full Sutton Prison, near York.

Steven Reed, for Townsend, said the defendant was given a minimum jail term of 17 years for the 2006 murder, but has a further conviction for false imprisonment, in 2013.

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Judge Jo Kidd said she wanted the full position relating to minimum sentence tariffs and earliest release dates or Parole Board hearings relating to both defendants before she considers sentence.

She added that she wanted submissions by defence counsel in the case as to the imposition of a further life sentence in each case, and the minimum jail terms she may be eligible to set, given the existing sentences the defendants are serving.

Both inmates, who appeared via video link from their respective prisons, were told they would be sentenced at a further hearing at the court on Friday (August 4).