When criminals are jailed, they are handed a minimum number of years they must spend behind bars at sentencing.
Those who have committed the most horrific offences - such as murder and rape - can be sentenced to life imprisonment, but this does not always mean life. Most of the time, even these criminals will be given a minimum term they must serve before being considered for release by the Parole Board.
Occasionally, judges sentence the most dangerous criminals to 'whole life orders' - meaning they will never be considered for release and will die in prison.
READ MORE: Locked up forever: The evil Manchester criminals who got 'whole life orders'
Others have been deemed so evil, judges have handed down minimum sentences of up to 55 years.
From the contract killer, to the sexual predator, here are some of the criminals serving Greater Manchester's longest prison sentences.
Samson Price
Samson Price, a father from Wigan, was sentenced to 33 years imprisonment after a brutal 'eye for eye' attack on a man he believed responsible for the death of his son.
Tragically, Samson Junior died in October 2020 after drowning in a Wigan park while with two friends - one of whom was Patrick Brown. Brown and the other friend were initially arrested over Samson Jnr's death, but were released without charge.
But Price was 'disgruntled' at the outcome of the police investigation, and took the law into his own hands. He attacked his son's childhood friend Patrick Brown outside the Puregym in Northwich with a 16-inch machete, having previously installed trackers on his van.
Brown suffered 21 separate lacerations from the attack - one of which nearly severed his right leg. Price then fled the scene and attempted to destroy evidence before handing himself in to a police station three weeks later.
A jury convicted Price of attempted murder, and he was handed an extended sentence of 33 years.
Mark Fellows
Mark Fellows was found guilty of the murder of Salford 'Mr Big' Paul Massey, as well as Mr Massey's friend John Kinsella, a Merseyside 'mob fixer'.
Described as a 'gun for hire', Fellows murdered Mr Massey in 2015 as part of an ongoing feud between rival gangs the A Team and the 'Anti' or 'AA Team'.
He then killed Mr Kinsella three years later while he walked his dogs with his partner.
Mr Justice Davis told Fellows 'few' judges had had to deal with 'a contract killer of your kind', before handing him a whole life order - meaning he will die in prison.
Wade Cox and Callum Halpin
Wade Cox and Callum Halpin were both handed large jail sentences for their role in the shocking murder of a dad who was shot dead in a street in front of playing children 'to send a chilling message' to rivals.
Rival drug dealer Luke Graham was blasted through the window of a van in Ashton-under-Lyne on June 13, 2018, sustaining a wound to his shoulder that proved fatal. Cox was found guilty of firing the shot - and after spending years on the run, Halpin was also convicted of murder.
A court heard how Cox and Halpin arranged the hit to 'send a chilling message' to their rivals. Cox was ordered to serve at least 36 years in jail, and Halpin was handed a minimum of 30 years.
Dale Cregan
Dale Cregan lured two female police officers to their deaths in a shocking and brutal attack in September 2012.
While on the run from police for two gangland killings, the one-eyed Cregan made a bogus police report of a break-in. PCs Fiona Bone, 32, from Sale, and Nicola Hughes, 23, from Saddleworth, attended, and were both shot upon arrival.
Cregan then threw a grenade on their bodies and handed himself in to police. The drug dealer had previously been at large after murdering gangland rivals Mark Short, 23, and his father David Short, 46, from Clayton.
During a high profile trial at Preston Crown Court in 2013, Cregan admitted murdering the two police officers, and later also pleaded guilty to killing the Shorts.
Following the trial he received a whole life order.
Michael Adebolajo
Radical extremist Michael Adebolajo brutally murdered soldier Lee Rigby, from Middleton, outside his barracks.
Alongside accomplice Michael Adebowale, he mowed into Rigby after noticing his 'Help for Heroes' hoodie in 2013. The father-of-one was a soldier in the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers.
A court heard how the pair had planned to murder a soldier to gain media attention, expecting that they would be killed during the incident and become 'martyrs'.
Adebolajo was deemed the leader of the plot, and was told by Mr Justice Sweeney he had 'no real prospect of rehabilitation'.
He was handed a whole life order.
Hashem Abedi
The brother of the Manchester Arena bomber Salman Abedi was handed a hefty sentence for his role in the tragedy.
In March 2020, a jury found 23-year-old Hashem guilty of 22 counts of murder, attempted murder and plotting to cause an explosion likely to endanger life. The court heard how he helped source, buy, stockpile and transport the components for his brother's bomb.
Mr Justice Baker said Hashem and his brother Salman, who died after detonating the bomb that killed 22 people, were 'equally culpable' for the attack.
He was sentenced to 55 years imprisonment.
Alan Maidment
Alan Maidment killed 72-year-old Paul Carlson in his flat in Manchester.
He took a hammer to Mr Carlson in July 1999, and was handed a life sentence for murder. But just nine months after he was released, he killed again in a similar manner.
Maidment brutally murdered 47-year-old father-of-one Thomas Jones, at his flat in Clifton. Mr Jones was stabbed 32 times before his body was set on fire in March 2017.
The killer initially confessed to police, but later took it back and ran a trial where he was found guilty. He was handed a whole life order after Judge David Stockdale QC told him: "You in my judgement are a highly dangerous man, who poses a real threat to the life of anyone who crosses you or is perceived to have insulted you."
Simon Goold
Sadistic rapist Simon Goold was jailed for life after strangling a woman to death with her t-shirt.
Goold, 52, targeted 26-year-old Elizabeth McCann after meeting her at a Health and Wellbeing college in Ashton-under-Lyne. He messaged her on Facebook before meeting her for a drink and plying the young woman, who rarely drank, with alcohol.
Goold then escorted her out of the pub after she became sick, and sexually assaulted her whilst she remained unresponsive and ’lifeless’ during the taxi journey back to his flat.
He then took explicit photos and videos of her, showing her bound at the hands with a t-shirt around her neck. The following morning Goold called 999 and told the police that there was a ‘dead woman in his bedsit’ and that he had killed her by strangling her during sex.
Goold was handed a life sentence with a minimum term of 35 years.
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