TIPTONVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — A grand jury returned dozens of indictments for five inmate murders, assaults against staff and inmates and other violence at a Tennessee prison, District Attorney Danny H. Goodman Jr. announced on Tuesday.
The Lake County grand jury returned 50 indictments in 19 cases involving violent acts committed at Northwest Correctional Complex, according to a release from Goodman. Some of those indicted include former staff members and inmates.
Those include murder charges related to inmates who were killed in five separate incidents in 2025 and 2026. The district attorney was withholding the names of those indicted until all the individuals have been arrested or served notice.
According to the DA, eight people were indicted for the first-degree murder of an inmate on Aug. 12, 2025. In another indictment, two former employees were indicted for aggravated assault, assault, official misconduct, official oppression and violating the oath of office.
Six people were indicted for the first-degree murder of an inmate on Oct. 8, 2025. Other indictments included charges of especially aggravated rape, especially aggravated kidnapping, attempted first-degree murder, assaults on correctional staff and possession of controlled substances.
“Violence within the Department of Corrections has increased significantly in the past few years and we will continue to prosecute these cases to make the penal system as safe as possible for not only the correctional officers but the inmates who are serving a sentence," Goodman said in a statement.
The Tennessee Department of Correction did not respond to requests for information about staff and inmates at the prison and the indictments.
Northwest Correctional Complex can house 1,776 male inmates and can house juvenile inmates who have been convicted as adults, according to the Department of Correction. In 2023, an audit of Tennessee prisons found that the department was struggling to fill open positions at the prison in Lake County and had a 61% vacancy rate for correctional officers in that fiscal year.
FILE - District Attorney General Danny Goodman speaks in court on Thursday, Sept. 4, 2025, in Tiptonville, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV, Pool, File)
A man running from an encounter with immigration and other federal agents in Florida was struck and killed by a tractor trailer on Tuesday, authorities said.
It was the third death in a week involving encounters with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, following shootings in Texas and Maine.
The 28-year-old was among four occupants of a vehicle that stopped in the parking lot of a gas station and convenience store in the St. Augustine area before 7 a.m. During an encounter with agents from ICE and Homeland Security Investigations, the four fled on foot, with one darting across a busy road into the path of the semi, Florida Highway Patrol Sgt. Dylan Bryan said in an emailed statement.
The driver of the semi stopped and tried to help the man, Bryan said.
It was at least the 10th death involving encounters with immigration agents since President Donald Trump launched his mass deportation campaign last year.
It wasn’t immediately clear what prompted the encounter Tuesday. In an emailed statement, the Department of Homeland Security confirmed it had conducted an operation and said the Florida Highway Patrol and Homeland Security Investigations were “investigating an incident resulting in the death of a Mexican national.”
The department did not respond to an inquiry from The Associated Press about the status of the other three occupants of the vehicle.
State Rep. Angie Nixon, a Democrat from Jacksonville, called the death a tragedy that resulted from an out-of-control agency.
“Whether it’s ICE agents gunning down a father in the streets of Houston, shooting a young man in Maine or conducting operations right here in Northeast Florida that result in a deadly crash, the outcome is the same: fear, chaos and death,” she said.
In two other cases, people died after fleeing agents and being struck by vehicles.
Last summer, a man running from immigration officers outside a Home Depot store in southern California died after being hit by an SUV as he tried to cross a freeway. Homeland Security officials said that 52-year-old Roberto Carlos Montoya Valdez, of Guatemala, was not being pursued by immigration authorities when he was struck.
In October, a pickup truck fatally struck 24-year-old gardener Josué Castro Rivera, of Honduras, on a highway in Norfolk, Virginia, as he tried to escape authorities during a traffic stop. Authorities said Castro Rivera’s vehicle was stopped as part of a “targeted, intelligence-based” operation and that Castro Rivera had “resisted heavily and fled.”
In this photo provided by the St. Johns County Sheriff's Office, the eastbound lanes of SR 16 between Outlet Mall Boulevard and Inman Road in St. Augustine, Fla., are shutdown after a fatal collision. (St. Johns County Sheriff's Office via AP)
