Former West Virginia prison guards plead guilty to civil rights violations in deadly attack on inmate

On November 22, 2024By Pranco

CHARLESTON, W.Va. (AP) – Two more former correctional officers in West Virginia have pleaded guilty to a federal civil rights violation in the death of a man who died less than a day after being booked into jail.

As part of the plea agreements, Johnathan Walters entered a plea in U.S. District Court on Monday and Corey Snyder pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiring with other officers to beat Quantez Burks in retaliation at the Southern Regional Jail in Beaver.

Walters and Snyder each face up to 30 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000. No sentencing date was immediately announced for either suspect.

They were among five former prison officers and a former prison lieutenant indicted by a federal grand jury in November 2023, the same month two other former prison officials pleaded guilty to the assault.

Burks, 37, was booked into jail in March 2022 for wanton endangerment. 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 were accused of beating him while he was restrained and handcuffed.

Walters and Snyder admitted they knew the interrogation room had no surveillance cameras and that prisoners and detainees who had previously engaged in misconduct had been brought to the room as punishment, court documents show.

Two other defendants will be sentenced in the case in January, and another three will be sentenced in February. A trial for the remaining defendant is scheduled for December 10.

The case has put a spotlight on prison conditions and deaths. Last year, West Virginia agreed to pay $4 million to settle a class action lawsuit filed by inmates who described prison conditions as inhumane. Gov. Jim Justice’s administration fired a Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation official and the Department of Homeland Security’s chief counsel after a federal magistrate judge cited the “intentional” destruction of documents in recommending a default judgment in the lawsuit .

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 2022 press conference that the second autopsy revealed Burks had multiple areas of blunt force trauma on his body.