An incarcerated man has died at Bibb Correctional Facility after being found unresponsive in his cell on Tuesday, according to the Alabama Department of Corrections.
Cory Luke White, 38, who was serving a 20-year sentence at the Bibb County facility for theft of property charge originating in Lauderdale County, was found unresponsive in his cell by correctional staff on Aug. 9. of this week, according to a statement released by the ADOC.
Correctional staff attempted life-saving measures on White but failed to revive him, according to the ADOC. White was pronounced dead later that Tuesday. The ADOC Law Enforcement Services Division is investigating the incident, according to the ADOC, with an autopsy of the cause of death pending.
White’s death marks the fifth incarcerated man to die in Bibb Correctional Facility since the beginning of June, according to statistics and statements released from the ADOC.
The unhindered flow of narcotics and other substances into Alabama’s correctional system has caused a visible increase in the rate of overdoses and deaths among the state’s incarcerated population. An ongoing lawsuit by the U.S Justice Department alleges that correctional staff in these facilities are unable to prevent mass amounts of narcotics from entering prisons.
The chronic overcapacity of nearly every state correctional facility in the state and critical understaffing of those facilities have also led to increases in inmate-on-inmate violence and deaths.
According to the latest data released by the ADOC, Bibb Correctional Facility housed 1,743 incarcerated men as of June. This, in a facility designed to hold only 918.
