By Michael Hill and Dave Collins
Associated Press
UTICA, N.Y. — Ten New York prison guards were charged Wednesday in connection with the fatal beating of a 22-year-old inmate in March — including two charged with murder. It’s the second time a group of correctional officers in the state was indicted for a death behind bars this year.
The indictment says several corrections officers severely beat Messiah Nantwi, a prisoner at the Mid-State Correctional Facility, who was hospitalized and died on March 1 “due to massive head trauma and numerous other injuries to his body.” Three corrections officers are also accused of orchestrating an effort to falsely claim that Nantwi had a makeshift knife in his room.
Nantwi’s death came several months after Robert Brooks was fatally beaten at the Marcy Correctional Facility, just across the street from the Mid-State prison. Six corrections officers have pleaded not guilty to murder charges in Brooks’ death and other prison employees have also been charged.
The Utica-area facility was one of many state prisons struggling to function during a three-week wildcat strike by guards. Correctional officers who were upset over working conditions began illegally walking off the job Feb. 17 at many state prisons, forcing the governor to send in National Guard troops to maintain operations. Incarcerated people and their advocates complained that services and conditions deteriorated during the walkout.
Lawyers for the two corrections officers charged with second-degree murder, Jonah Levi and Caleb Blair, entered not guilty pleas at an indictment hearing Wednesday. They’re also charged with first-degree manslaughter alongside three other guards. The beatings and lack of urgency about getting him medical attention “demonstrated depraved indifference” for Nantwi’s life, the indictment said.
Gov. Kathy Hochul called it a “horrific crime” in announcing the indictments Tuesday.
“The tragic death of Mr. Nantwi at the hands of correction officers who are responsible for protecting the incarcerated population is deeply, deeply disturbing,” Hochul said in a brief video message.
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Levi and Blair were part of an emergency response team called to Nantwi’s room to help National Guard members with an “unknown issue.” His hands were raised when the correctional officers first entered the room but he protested being handcuffed for no apparent reason and grabbed another guard’s vest, the indictment says. Several guards immediately began raining down blows on his head and body using their boots, the document says. The attack intensified when Nantwi bit Blair and another corrections officer, Thomas Eck, on their hands.
Nantwi became unresponsive and corrections officers transported him toward the infirmary. Nantwi was assaulted a second time in a stairwell and was “dumped in a holding cell at the infirmary and further assaulted” by Blair, the indictment says.
Six of the 10 corrections officers are accused in the indictment of taking part in beating Nantwi. Five of the six — Levi, Blair, Eck, Craig Klemick and Daniel Burger — are also charged with first-degree manslaughter and first-degree gang assault. All six, including Sgt. Francis Chandler Jr., are charged with second-degree gang assault.
The other four corrections officers allegedly took part in an attempted cover-up by making false statements or tampering with evidence, according to the indictment. Four of the 10 guards were sergeants. Two of the sergeants, Chandler and David Ferrone, are charged with second-degree manslaughter for allegedly not trying to stop the assaults on Nantwi.
According to the evidence tampering charge, Chandler ordered a corrections officer to retrieve a weapon that had been confiscated earlier that day in an incident not involving Nantwi. At Chandler’s asking, Eck “volunteered” to lie to authorities about finding it on the floor in Nantwi’s room.
The attorney general’s office has recused itself in Nantwi’s case, citing its representation of several correctional officers in civil lawsuits. A special prosecutor was appointed, Onondaga County District Attorney William Fitzpatrick, who is also the prosecutor in Brooks’ death.
Nantwi entered the state prison system last May and had been serving a five-year sentence for second-degree criminal possession of a weapon related to an exchange of gunfire with police officers in 2021. He was shot multiple times, while the officers were uninjured.
Prosecutors in Manhattan say Nantwi shot and killed Jaylen Duncan, 19, on a Harlem street in April 2023. The following evening, they say, he shot and killed Brandon Brunson, 36, at a Harlem smoke shop after an argument.
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Collins contributed from Hartford, Connecticut.