Former Prison Lieutenant Sentenced to 3 Years for Failing to Help Inmate Who Later Died

Michael Anderson, a former high-ranking officer at a Virginia federal prison, failed to respond to the medical emergency of an inmate who subsequently died from blunt force trauma to the head.

Michael Anderson, a former lieutenant at a federal prison in Virginia, has been sentenced to three years in prison for failing to help an inmate who suffered a medical emergency and later died.
The inmate, identified only as W.W., exhibited symptoms that included incoherence and the inability to stand, and continuously fell inside his cell and later in a suicide-watch cell.
W.W. died of blunt force trauma to the head. A medical examiner said he would have lived if he had been hospitalized and examined at any point in his ordeal.
Correctional officers and suicide watch observers had notified prison supervisors and asked for help, but Anderson was one of the supervisors who failed to act.
Anderson pleaded guilty in July to one count of deprivation of civil rights. His attorney argued that the inmate's death was a collaborative failure on the part of multiple staff members.

U.S. Department of Justice