CHARLESTON, W.Va. — Five former correctional officers in West Virginia were indicted Thursday by a federal grand jury in connection with the 2022 death of an incarcerated man who was beaten while handcuffed and restrained in an interrogation room and later in a jail cell.
All five officers, as well as a former lieutenant, are also accused of covering up their actions, the U.S. Department of Justice said.
The charges in the Southern U.S. District Court in West Virginia come weeks after two different West Virginia corrections officers pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge stemming from the fatal beating of the same inmate, 37-year-old Quantez Burks.
Burks was a pretrial detainee at the Southern Regional Jail in Beaver who died less than a day after being booked into the jail in March 2022 for wanton endangerment.
The case has put a spotlight on conditions and deaths at the Southern Regional Jail. Earlier this month, West Virginia agreed to pay $4 million to settle a class action lawsuit filed by inmates who described prison conditions as inhumane. The lawsuit filed last year on behalf of current and former inmates cited complaints including a lack of access to water and food at the facility, as well as overcrowding and fighting that was allowed to continue until someone was injured.
Gov. Jim Justice's administration fired former Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation Director Brad Douglas and Chief Homeland Security Attorney Phil Sword after a federal magistrate judge cited the “intentional” destruction of documents in recommending a default judgment in the court case. That followed a hearing in early October in which former and current corrections officials, including some defendants in the lawsuit, said no steps had been taken to preserve evidence at the jail, including emails and documents.
The indictment filed Thursday alleges that three former Southern Regional Jail correctional officers — 39-year-old Mark Holdren, 29-year-old Cory Snyder and 35-year-old Johnathan Walters — conspired with other officers at the jail to unlawfully kill Burks to hit. in an act of retaliation.
According to court documents, Burks tried to push past an officer to leave his housing unit. Burks was then escorted to an interrogation room where correctional officers are accused of beating Burks while he was restrained and handcuffed. He was later forcibly transferred to a prison cell in another housing unit, where he was attacked again.
West Virginia Homeland Security Secretary Mark Sorsaia said Thursday that the state was working closely with federal law enforcement to secure charges against the ex-corrections staff.
“It is important to note that we have alerted federal authorities to this matter and have worked closely with federal authorities throughout the investigation to help hold those responsible for unlawful acts accountable,” he said .
Sorsaia said the state has “zero tolerance for abuse of any kind against inmates housed in our state facilities.”
Contact information for the charged officers was not immediately available.
On November 2, former officers Andrew Fleshman and Steven Wimmer pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge stemming from the fatal assault. Their sentencings are set for February 22.
The state medical examiner's office attributed Burks' primary cause of death to natural causes, prompting the family to request a private autopsy. The family's attorney revealed at a news conference last year that the second autopsy showed the inmate had multiple areas of blunt trauma on his body.
Two other former corrections officers were indicted Thursday on charges of failing to intervene in the unlawful attack that resulted in Burks' death. All five officers, as well as a former lieutenant, are accused of covering up the use of unlawful force by omitting material information and providing false and misleading information to investigators.
Walters, Holdren and another officer filed incident reports that contained false and misleading information, the complaint alleges. The indictment also accuses Holdren, Snyder and two other agents of making false statements to the FBI.