Daniel Williams Alabama inmate tied up, beaten, rented out by gang before dying as Alabama Department of Corrections faces questions as to the brutal assault and death on their watch- a death that should have been prevented, but seemingly encouraged or by neglect?
Why was it allowed to happen? A 22-year-old man incarcerated in an Alabama prison has died just two weeks before his scheduled release after being beaten and sexually assaulted by a ‘prison gang’ according to his family.
Daniel Terry Williams was serving the final days of a 12-month sentence for second-degree theft at Staton Correctional Facility when he was ‘discovered unresponsive in his dorm’ on Oct. 22, the Alabama Department of Corrections said in a statement that acknowledged a ‘possible inmate-on-inmate assault’ had been reported.
Williams’ family and several unnamed prison sources told the Alabama Political Reporter that he had been kidnapped and tortured for at least two days before being found and taken to a hospital, where he was declared brain dead. Prior to his death, the family had been told Williams was related to a drug overdose.
Why and how such tragedies occurring?
‘When we went to see him he’s beaten and bruised up and you can tell where his hands were bound,’ Williams’ stepmother said.
“And that’s when [dad Terry Williams] called the warden and asked him why the hell he told us that his son is dying from a drug overdose when it’s obviously assault,’ the stepmom added.
‘And all he could say after that was it’s under investigation.’
Williams’ family eventually learned he had been kidnapped and raped or ‘tied up, beaten, and rented out for two to three days’ by another prisoner.
The dad of two was taken off life support on Nov. 5 and died four days later according to a GoFundMe set up to handle funeral expenses.
‘Deaths like that of Mr. Williams are tragic, preventable, and happen all too frequently in Alabama’s prisons,’ said Bryan Stevenson, the director of the Equal Justice Initiative.
The question is why do they happen and who is responsible for their cover up and why so little is done to prevent such tragedies and why prison workers seemingly are complicit in the mendacious treatment by fellow prisoners and or at the very least, turning a wanton blind eye…?
Untenable prison conditions in correctional facilities
Federal authorities have been investigating violence in Alabama prisons since 2019, when the U.S. Department of Justice issued a report saying the conditions violated the civil rights of inmates.
The department sued in 2020. The state does not do enough to prevent prison-on-prisoner violence and sexual assault, according to the report.
Prisons in Alabama have struggled with low staffing and officials have said they need new facilities to address the violence. Gov. Kay Ivey and other leaders have proposed building a 4,000-bed prison that could cost more than $1 billion.
According to the most recent report, the Alabama Department of Corrections has almost 20,000 people in facilities built for about 12,000. There were 1,897 total assaults in the first eight months of the year.
