According to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, a corrections officer is facing second-degree murder charges for fatally beating a handcuffed inmate at Lake Correctional Institution after he “refused a command in his cell.”
On Monday, 27-year-old Michael Raymond Riley Jr. was taken into custody after being apprehended by the Polk County Sheriff’s Office.
Further details regarding the circumstances of the incident were not provided.
However, authorities said “the victim died as a result of actions taken by Riley in his capacity as a correctional officer.”
The late prisoner was reportedly identified as Christopher Howell, 51-year-old.
He was sentenced to four years behind bars for stealing phone chargers from Target.
Two members of the prison staff have witnessed the attack but have not intervened, reports said.
Howell was described by cellmates as a man with the “mind of a 10-year-old boy.”
Riley brutally attacked and beat Howell to the point his neck broke.
