A Georgia inmate was shot dead inside a hospital after he pepper sprayed a prison guard and then charged toward a second one Tuesday night, authorities said.
Prisoner Jacob Henson was receiving medical care around 8:45 p.m. after he was stabbed during an earlier brawl inside Washington State Prison when he got into a fight with one of the state corrections officers accompanying him to the hospital, the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said.
Henson, 31, overpowered the officer and grabbed the guard’s canister of pepper spray, dispersing the gas that left him “incapacitated,” the agency said.
As he went to confront another corrections officer while continuing to use the spray, that guard shot Henson, according to the GBI.
He was pronounced dead at the scene.
The police agency said it’s investigating the use of deadly force by the corrections officer and also probing the earlier incident where Henson was stabbed inside the prison complex.
“Once the investigation is complete, it will be given to the Middle Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office for review,” the agency said.
Henson was serving a 8-year prison sentence on 25 criminal counts, the Cherokee County District Attorney’s previously said. He was also required to serve another 12 years of probation following the stint in prison.
He carried out a spree of vehicle thefts and other criminal acts in summer 2018 before his arrest and subsequent guilty plea.
