Chicago – March 15, 2026
Former “London’s Burning” and Grange Hill actor John Alford has been found dead in prison, two months after being jailed for sexually assaulting two teenage girls. He was 54.
The Prison Service said Alford, whose real name was John Shannon, died at HMP Bure in Norfolk on 13 March, adding that, as with all deaths in custody, the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman will now investigate. The cause of death has not yet been made public.
Alford was serving an eight-and-a-half-year sentence imposed in January after a jury found he had sexually assaulted girls aged 14 and 15 at a house party.
Alford first rose to fame in the mid-1980s in the BBC children’s drama Grange Hill before gaining wider recognition as firefighter Billy Ray in ITV’s London’s Burning. His later career was overshadowed by criminal convictions, including a 1990s drugs case that led to a previous prison term.
