Who is Osvaldo Durruthy? Inmate who tried to kill Jeffrey Dahmer with razor in jail says he has no regrets
MADISON, WISCONSIN: The prisoner who attempted to assassinate serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer in a failed attack is standing by his conduct 30 years later claiming he would do it again if given the chance. Osvaldo Durruthy, 65, had attempted to kill Dahmer by slicing his throat with a razor blade months before the infamous Milwaukee Monster was killed by fellow prisoner Christopher Scarver in 1994.
The unsuccessful assault led to another conviction for the Cuban-born refugee which ultimately increased his sentence by five years. However, Durruthy said he doesn't regret what he did in an interview with Daily Mail three decades later and explained he was always determined to kill the infamous killer and cannibal. The former criminal, who had never met Dahmer, described how he even managed to get himself transferred to the same prison where he was already detained in order to have his chance. Speaking to Daily Mail, Durruthy said: “I don't have an ounce of regret on what I did to Jeffrey Dahmer. I tried to kill him, and I failed. I don't even regret having to spend an extra five years in prison because I tried to kill him. And I'm glad someone else got him.” Dahmer, who killed 17 men and boys between 1978 and 1991, is regarded as one of the most frightening serial killers in American history. His victims were between 14 and 33 years old and he committed cannibalism and necrophilia in many of his murders. Due to Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, a new Netflix series that has amassed a viewership of nearly 200 million, interest in the historic case has recently increased once more. Durruthy arrived in the US as part of the Mariel boatlift, the 1980 mass exodus of Cubans, having spent more than half of his life behind bars in both his native Cuba and the US.
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In 1991, after being freed, he was detained once more seven months later. This time, he was found guilty and given a 31-year prison term for possessing a handgun and more than 2 kilograms of cocaine with the intent to deliver. He received a prison sentence in Waupun, Wisconsin. 40 miles away at Columbia Correctional Institution in Portage, Wisconsin, Dahmer began serving his term at the same time in 1992. At the time, Durruthy was aware of Dahmer and the terrible acts he had committed and he would later develop a fixation on killing him. “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,” Durruthy said. “At the time I thought I had nothing to lose, I was facing years in prison that seemed like a life sentence. I wanted to kill him for my family and for the black community,” he said, as most of Dahmer's victims were poor black, Latino or of Asian descent. Durruthy immediately devised a strategy to be sent to Columbia after learning that Dahmer was there. He had constructed a reason to travel to Columbia which has a sizable inmate mental health facility, knowing that he couldn't just ask for a transfer. In order to get to Columbia's mental health facility, Durruthy started acting crazy, taking medications, and doing other strange things. After more than two years, a jail doctor finally gave him a schizophrenia diagnosis and he was transferred in the middle of June 1994. He was shocked to see that Dahmer was incarcerated in the single cell next door to him when he first arrived. Durruthy claimed that he had no idea how he would kill him but that he was prepared to do it when the opportunity arose.
He first encountered Dahmer in the unit's dining room where everyone in custody shared meals. “Dahmer ate alone at a table in the dining hall,” Durruthy told Daily Mail. “But prisoners would go up to him and ask him for his food, a cookie or whatever they were serving that day for dessert and Dahmer would gladly give it to them. I've never said a word to Jeffrey Dahmer in my life. I would sit a few tables away at the dining hall observing him while he ate, with a smile on my face thinking to myself, I'm going to kill you one day.” A few days later, he finally had his chance in the prison yard. Near the weight area, Dahmer was by himself. Durruthy intended to ram his head into something solid by grabbing a weight or a metal weight bar. He believed he could fire many shots before a prison guard jumped to Dahmer’s rescue. Durruthy claimed that while waiting for the proper moment, he noticed another prisoner in the yard that he was familiar with from a separate facility. It was reassuring to see someone Durruthy knew since he had only been at the facility for a week. He started a conversation with his prison companion and explained his strategy to him. But he did not anticipate that the prisoner wanted to participate as well.
Durruthy was, however, moved to another unit later that evening, far from Dahmer. While Durruthy thought he had missed his chance and would never see Dahmer again, he later recalled that on Sundays, all prisoners were permitted to attend services, so he hoped Dahmer would be present. He prepared by taking the blades out of his prison razor, affixing them to the handle of an old toothbrush and creating a shank that was about four inches long. He concealed the shank on Sunday, July 3, 1994, between his shirt and belt. As he entered the hallway, jail guards searched him but were unable to locate it. He noticed Dahmer sitting three rows in front of him. He needed to go closer without drawing notice because he knew he couldn't pull the shank out of his waistband in time to reach Dahmer and slit his throat before the guards found him. He explained to security that he was experiencing stomach pains and needed to use the restroom. Durruthy then left the services to use the restroom, took the shank out of his waistband, put it in his sock and then came back. “As soon as I sat down, I removed the shank from my sock, put it in my right hand,” he recalled. “I stood up, with my left arm I put Dahmer in a head lock and with my right hand I began to slash his throat with the razor shank. I was slashing him back and forth as fast as I could. After a few slashes the shank broke. It wasn't strong enough, it fell out of my hand on to the floor. 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. Dahmer was pulled away screaming, 'I didn't do anything,” he narrated the incident to Daily Mail.
Durruthy was placed in solitary confinement and Dahmer was transported to the prison hospital ward to receive treatment for minor wounds. After being charged with attacking a prisoner, Durruthy entered a guilty plea and received an additional five years in prison. In 2016, after 25 years in prison, he was granted parole. “I wanted to kill Dahmer; he ate people. But I guess God was watching over me and didn't want me to kill him,” Durruthy said. “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.” Five months later, another prisoner would ultimately murder Dahmer in his cell. On November 28, 1994, Dahmer was struck with a 20-inch metal rod by fellow prisoner Christopher Scarver who was serving a life sentence for murder. Durruthy, now a free man, resides in a condominium in a town outside of Madison, Wisconsin. Along with his two grandchildren, he spends time with his son who is 38 years old.