The prisoner who attempted to kill Jeffrey Dahmer said he’d do it again and has no regrets

‘I wanted to kill Dahmer; he ate people’


If you have watched Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story or know anything about the case itself then you probably picked up on the fact a man tried to kill Dahmer before Christopher Scarver did. That man is called Osvaldo Durruthy and he says he has absolutely no regrets and he’d “do it again”. Here’s everything you need to know about Osvaldo Durruthy, the man who originally tried to kill Jeffrey Dahmer.

Who was Osvaldo Durruthy?

Now 65-years-old, Osvaldo Durruthy was in prison on a drug conviction in 1992 when he heard Jeffrey Dahmer was inside another prison just 40 miles away. In an interview with the Daily Mail, Durruthy said: “I’ve done a lot of bad things in my life that wouldn’t make my family too proud I thought that if I killed him, I could make up for some of the bad things I had done.”

How did he attempt to kill Jeffrey Dahmer?

via Netflix

Durruthy faked symptoms of mental illness for months before a doctor diagnosed him with schizophrenia and ordered him to be transferred to Dahmer’s prison in 1994. After making a weapon from razor blades and a toothbrush, on 3rd July 1994, he hid the shank in between his shirt and waistband. When prison guards searched him as he entered the hall, they failed to find it.

When he sat down he saw Dahmer was too many rows ahead and he had to get closer to him. He reportedly told a guard that he had an upset stomach and needed to use the bathroom. He left for the toilet, removed the shank from his waistband and put it in his sock before returning to the service. He was then able to sit directly one row behind Dahmer and cut his throat a few times before the shank broke. He told the Daily Mail the shank wasn’t strong enough and it fell out of his hand onto the floor, he said: “He was still in a headlock with my left arm so with my right hand I started to punch him in the face and many times as I could before prison guards jumped in and pulled me off him.”

Months after this attempt, Dahmer was murdered by Christopher Scarver but Durruthy still received an additional five years in prison over the assault. Durruthy sold the Daily Mail he doesn’t have “an ounce of regret and I’m glad someone else got him.”

Where is Osvaldo Durruthy today?

Durruthy was released on parole in 2016 after serving 25 years in prison. He told the Daily Mail: “I wanted to kill Dahmer; he ate people. But I guess God was watching over me and didn’t want me to kill him. I don’t regret what I did, if I had the chance to do it again I would. I really tried to kill him. I’m glad Dahmer is dead. Maybe when word got out that I tried to kill him, it gave other inmates ideas.”

Now Durruthy lives in an apartment in a city outside of Madison, Wisconsin where he spends time with his son and two grandchildren.

Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story is available now on Netflix. For all the latest Netflix news, drops, quizzes and memes like The Holy Church of Netflix on Facebook. 

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