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John Alford, a former British actor known for his roles in the popular TV shows “London’s Burning” and “Grange Hill,” has been found dead in prison at the age of 54.
Alford had been serving a sentence of eight years and six months after being convicted of multiple sex offenses involving two teenage girls in 2022. His incarceration began earlier this year.
The news of his death was reported by The Mirror, which included a statement from a prison representative confirming the incident.
“John Shannon died in prison on 13 March 2026,” the statement revealed.
“John Shannon died in prison on 13 March 2026,” it read.
“As with all deaths in custody, the Prisons and Probation Ombudsman will investigate.”
Alford’s real surname was Shannon, though he used the former as his stage name.
According to The Sun, Alford was found unresponsive in his bed at the Category C HMP Bure in Norfolk. While medics were called, the actor did not wake despite their attempts.
“He didn’t wake up in the morning. He was in his bed and they thought he was just asleep,” a source told the publication.
“When they tried to wake him there was no response and they realized he was dead.”
The actor rose to fame in the 1980s thanks to his role as rebel Robbie Wright in the BBC teen drama “Grange Hill”. He was just 13 at the time. He later moved on to star as fireman Billy Ray in “London’s Burning” in the 1990s.
Despite his popularity on the program, Alford’s career on TV was short-lived. He was famously sacked from the TV series after he was convicted for supplying cocaine and cannabis.
He was sentenced to nine months in jail in 1999, serving just six weeks behind bars.
He briefly broke back into acting in the early 2000s but found himself in trouble with the law once again in 2018 when he was charged for resisting a police officer.
At the time of his death, Alford was only months into serving out a sentence connected to the assaults of two young females.
The actor attacked the two girls, aged 14 and 15, while they were drunk after a night out at a pub in April 2022.
Alford was staying at a friend’s Hertfordshire house, also the father to a third girl, at the time of the assault.
The trial heard he had intercourse with the 14-year-old female and touched the 15-year-old inappropriately while she was half asleep.
Chris White, from the Crown Prosecution Service, said the disgraced star was “fully aware of the girls’ ages, yet he chose to exploit them,” as per Sky News.
The actor was found guilty on four counts of sexual activity with one girl and sexual assault and assault by penetration relating to the other at St Albans Crown Court in September last year.
At the time, he insisted the jury’s guilty verdict was “wrong”.