Three inmates died and a dozen others were taken to hospital with injuries after a “possible riot” on Sunday at a state prison in Georgia, authorities said.
The Washington county sheriff, Joel Cochran, said several “major fights” broke out early Sunday afternoon at a state prison in Davisboro, the Georgia television news outlet WMAZ reported, resulting in 13 prisoners being transported for treatment.
One of them died in hospital, Cochran said, with two others deceased in the facility, a medium security prison with a capacity of 1,548 inmates. In October, Cochran said criminal gangs were operating drugs enterprises from within Washington and other state prison facilities – and had used drones to smuggle in drugs and cellphones.
“What we understand occurred early this afternoon is that several major fights broke out within the facility between inmates which has resulted in approximately 13 inmates being transported out of the facility for medical treatment,” Cochran told WMAZ on Sunday.
Cochran said: “it’s not uncommon for these things to happen at correctional facilities; however, I think it has been quite some time since we’ve had to come to an incident this large”.
The sheriff added that the fighting was among inmates, but he believed one prison guard might have been hurt.
In a statement the Georgia department of corrections said the three dead prisoners were Ahmod Hatcher, Jimmy Trammell and Teddy Jackson.
“At approximately 1.25pm an altercation began on the sidewalk among several inmates, at which time, staff initiated procedures to clear the visitation area. During this process, several injured inmates were able to enter the visitation area, however, no visitors were injured and were safely escorted out of the facility,” the statement said.
It added: “Staff responded immediately to the altercation and deployed non-lethal weapons.”
Cochran said his deputies were joined by Georgia state troopers, the Davisboro police department and Johnson county sheriff’s office at the scene. Coroner’s office staff were also present, he said.
The Human and Civil Rights Coalition of Georgia identified one of the deceased prisoners on its Facebook page as Jimmy Stillwell Trammell. Trammell was scheduled for release in the upcoming week after completing a 10-year sentence.
Separately, the coalition posted video footage of what appeared to be multiple prisoners running from the building. It said the incident was “complete chaos and violence”.
Prison riots with fatalities are relatively rare in the US, although there have been several recent deaths after violent altercations. In June, one prisoner was killed in a fight at US penitentiary in Beaumont, Texas, the same facility where two prisoners died in 2022 in gang violence that led to a temporary lockdown at all federal facilities.
The deadliest most recent incident was in 2018 at the Lee correctional institution, South Carolina, when seven prisoners died and 17 were hurt in a mass fight involving knives.
A five-day riot at the Attica correctional facility in Buffalo, New York, in 1975 remains the nation’s bloodiest, with 43 prisoners, officers and civilians dead.
