22-year-old father of two killed in prison

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Summary: Daniel Terry Williams, 22, was killed in an Alabama prison assault days before his Nov. 9, 2023, release. No criminal charges followed a 2024 grand jury review. His family sued corrections leaders.

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Daniel Terry Williams, a 22-year-old father of two, entered Alabama’s prison system in 2023 to serve a one-year sentence for assault and theft. By early fall that year he was housed at Staton Correctional Facility in Elmore County, Alabama, and counted the days until his scheduled release on Nov. 9.

On or around Oct. 19, 2023, other inmates, reportedly negros, took him from his assigned area and held him against his will for several days inside an open dormitory. During that time he was restrained, forced to take drugs, beaten and sexually assaulted, according to later court filings and accounts from fellow prisoners. On Oct. 22 officers found him unresponsive on another inmate’s bed and sent him to a hospital. Medical staff placed him on life support. Family members who visited saw clear signs of restraint and severe trauma that did not match the overdose explanation first given by authorities.

Williams never recovered. On Nov. 9, 2023—the exact day he was due to walk free—he was taken off life support and died. The Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences ruled the death a homicide caused by probable asphyxia from smothering. The autopsy also noted ligature marks and multiple injuries consistent with prolonged restraint and assault.

Investigators identified a primary suspect with a documented history of prior violent and sexual offenses inside Alabama prisons. The case reached an Elmore County grand jury in October 2024. After reviewing the evidence, the panel declined to return an indictment for murder, manslaughter or criminally negligent homicide, citing insufficient probable cause. District Attorney C.J. Robinson left open the possibility of presenting the matter again if new evidence appears.

In December 2024 the mother of Williams’ surviving daughter filed a federal wrongful-death lawsuit in Montgomery. The suit names Alabama Department of Corrections Commissioner John Hamm and three Staton wardens. It alleges the officials failed to protect Williams despite knowing the risks posed by the identified inmate and by long-standing problems of overcrowding and understaffing at the facility.

Williams had posted online shortly before the attack that he was nearly finished with his sentence and planned to return home drug-free. Instead, a short prison term ended in his death on the day freedom was supposed to begin. The criminal case remains without charges, while the civil action continues.

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Suspects are considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.

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Sources/related links:

https://alabamaappleseed.org/author/eddie-burkhalter/after-investigation-no-criminal-charges-in-the-torture-and-homicide-of-daniel-williams-at-staton-prison/
https://www.al.com/news/2024/12/family-sues-alabama-prisons-after-inmate-allegedly-endured-days-of-beating-rape-and-died-day-of-his-release.html
https://abc3340.com/news/local/grand-jury-fails-to-issue-indictment-in-torture-death-of-prison-inmate-daniel-williams

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