Last updated October 4, 2026.(DS)

Coastal State Prison: A Medium-Security Facility Under Sustained Pressure

Coastal State Prison sits on the edge of Port Wentworth in Chatham County, a short drive from Savannah. It opened in 1981, was renovated in 1999, and was built to hold 420 men. Today its rated capacity is 1,836, and GPS's facility record puts the current population at 1,633 — roughly 89 percent of rated capacity, but nearly four times the number the plant was designed for. The prison holds 12 housing units: six cellblocks mixing two-man and four-man cells, four open-bay dormitories, one unit reserved for Faith & Character and incentive-program participants, a 74-bed segregation unit, and a small infirmary. It also runs an abbreviated diagnostic intake unit and maintains a tactical squad, which makes it a hub for both housing and system-wide security operations. David Stokes took over as warden on June 1, 2026, following his reassignment from Central State Prison; Deputy Wardens Briana Kaigler and Karen Ruth Finch round out the leadership.

What follows is an account of what public records, court filings, state inspection reports, and GPS's own tracking show about conditions inside that plant — a facility where the documented death toll since 2020, the condition of the kitchen, the state of the housing units, and the accounts of the people held there converge on a single theme.

A Death Toll That Has Not Slowed

GPS's mortality registry records 135 deaths at Coastal State Prison since January 1, 2020 — a floor, not a ceiling, since GDC reports deaths roughly two months late. The yearly distribution shows no downward trend: 17 deaths in 2020, 19 in 2021, 15 in each of 2022 and 2023, then 24 in 2024 and 26 in 2025. Through 2026 the registry already carries 19 more.

The registry's cause coding is itself a finding. Of the 135 deaths, 92 are classified Unknown/Pending — GPS does not yet know the cause. Thirty-five are coded Natural/Medical, five Homicide, and three Other. The most recent entries include Sheldon Leroy Burns, who died August 30, 2026, with the cause listed as Natural/Medical; Phillip Alexander George, 66, who died July 16, 2026; Corey Marcel Mitchell, 50, who died July 15, 2026; Bobby Clinton Biggs, 77, who died June 25, 2026; Ronald Tyrone Waller, 57, who died June 10, 2026; Rene Alvarado Salazar, 38, who died April 19, 2026; Mark Jr Young, 75, who died April 17, 2026; Terry Kendall, 67, who died February 27, 2026, at Coastal State Prison, with the registry listing the cause as Unknown/Pending; Stanley Brown, 61, who died February 27, 2026, at Coastal State Prison, with the registry listing the cause as Unknown/Pending; Anteveis Brown, 49, who died February 26, 2026, at Coastal State Prison, with the registry listing the cause as Homicide; Aiden Snapp, 21, who died February 26, 2026, at Coastal State Prison, with the registry listing the cause as Homicide; Richard Parks, 62, who died February 21, 2026; Malik Ortiz, 29, who died February 12, 2026; Dejarvis Walker, 25, who died February 9, 2026; Michael Garcia, 45, who died February 1, 2026; Thomas Lee Garrison, 78, who died January 26, 2026; Deandre Martez Walker, 37, who died January 22, 2026; Jabe Clark, 32, who died January 17, 2026; Kevin Lloyd Strickland, 52, who died January 13, 2026; James Dion Gilmore, 46, who died December 26, 2025; Thomas Jacob Johnson, 57, who died December 23, 2025; Jeffrey Brandon Deaton, who died December 20, 2025; Nelson Nmn Williams, 54, who died December 4, 2025; James Joseph Reinke, 66, who died November 29, 2025; and Thomas Floyd East, 71, who died November 18, 2025. For every one of those listed as Unknown/Pending, GPS does not yet know the cause and does not guess one. The full registry for the facility is published at gps.press/georgia-prison-deaths/facility/coastal-state-prison/.

The deaths that drew news coverage tell a narrower story. WTOC reported that a Coastal State Prison inmate died on a Sunday in mid-February 2026, with GDC confirming the death and releasing no further details. Ten days later the same outlet confirmed a second death within one week. By early March, two inmates had died on the same day at the facility, again with no circumstances or identities released. GPS's registry places Aiden Snapp, 21, and Anteveis Brown, 49, as homicides on February 26, 2026 — the same date as the "second death in one week" report.

Earlier deaths produced litigation. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that Raymond Littles, 49, died April 16, 2024, in an incident classified as a homicide, with another prisoner disciplined; no death certificate was available at the time. Ryan Chase Archer, 25, died December 13, 2023, from a stab wound to the chest after a fight with other prisoners — he had been due for release in 2024. Salomon Andres Ramirez, 43, died October 20, 2023, in what GDC classified as an apparent homicide, cause of death unstated. Rufus Ramon Lee, 27, died December 14, 2021, from a stab wound to the chest; an incident report shows four other prisoners involved, and four inmates were indicted. Kion E. Parks, 31, died September 14, 2021, from stab wounds; an incident report shows five other prisoners involved.

Lawsuits, Settlements, and the Question of the Locks

Two lawsuits filed in January 2025 and covered by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution describe the mechanics of how men died at Coastal. A lawsuit alleges five inmates stabbed Kion E. Parks to death at the facility on September 14, 2021. A separate lawsuit filed by Rufus Ramon Lee's mother alleges that a broken cell lock allowed assailants from other cells and dorms to reach and kill her son. Both are allegations pleaded in civil complaints, not adjudicated findings.

The state's own settlement ledger, obtained through open records from the Georgia Department of DOAS Risk Management, records payouts tied to the facility across more than a decade. The largest is $600,000 in the 2022 death of Dennis Carpenter, linked to a documented death record. Others include $200,000 in the 2019 death of Joel Greene, $115,000 in the 2011 death of Milton Ross, $50,000 in the 2016 death of Cager Maleeah, and $8,000 in a 2023 matter involving Ronald Ray Agan. These are liability payments the state made, not admissions of fault — but they establish that the state has repeatedly paid out over what happened inside this prison.

The broken-lock allegation lands against a documented systemwide pattern. GPS has reported that most GDC facilities are 30 to 40 or more years old, with deferred maintenance producing infrastructure failures across the system: broken cell-door locks, inoperative surveillance and fire-alarm systems, mold and water failures, broken kitchen sanitization equipment, and pest infestations. The 2012 Hays audit found roughly 42 percent of cell-door locks non-functional, and the 2024 Guidehouse assessment confirmed the pattern. The October 2024 DOJ findings, the Guidehouse assessment, and Commissioner Tyrone Oliver's own public statements about facilities reaching "end of life" all corroborate it. GPS treats infrastructure collapse as a force multiplier for the violence, classification, and mortality crises documented at the facility level.

The Kitchen: A Grade C and What Inspectors Found

On April 23, 2026, the Georgia Department of Public Health inspected the Coastal State Prison kitchen and issued a score of 70 — a Grade C. Eleven violations were cited, including the person in charge failing to demonstrate knowledge and perform duties, food not stored covered, and food-contact surfaces not cleaned and sanitized. The Georgia Virtue reported the inspection in detail: inspectors found fish at 122°F and chicken at 98°F sitting on the counter, both below the required 135°F hot-holding temperature. They found mildew-like buildup inside the ice machine and no sanitizer in the three-compartment sink while inmates were actively washing dishes — a repeat violation. They observed mold-like growth on ceiling tiles throughout the entire kitchen, along with peeling and missing ceiling tiles, also a repeat violation. They observed live flies and roaches in the kitchen and a dead mouse floating in backed-up mop water in the mess hall dishpit — another repeat violation. Inspectors also documented exit doors with large gaps underneath and damage allowing entry of insects and rodents, and multiple plumbing failures: a leaking pipe, a sink where hot water could not be turned on or off, a loose spigot, and a backed-up mop sink. The facility was given until May 3 to correct the issues.

The trajectory matters as much as the score. WTOC reported that Coastal has been on a steady decline since at least February 2025 — an 87 in February 2025, an 80 in October 2025, and then the 70 in April 2026. DPH's own records bear this out: 84 in October 2023, 87 in February 2025, 80 in October 2025, 70 in April 2026. The most recent inspection, on July 27, 2026, scored 98 — a Grade A with a single violation for warewashing facilities and test strips.

That rebound is exactly the pattern GPS has documented across GDC kitchens, and it should not be read as proof that conditions improved. GPS has documented a systemic pattern of food-service sanitation failure that DPH scores systematically fail to capture: tray-sanitizing dishwashers broken for sustained periods, sustained roach and rodent infestation in kitchen and serving areas, and meals served on visibly contaminated trays. The pattern is hidden from DPH scores because inspections are scheduled walkthroughs that do not assess equipment under load, and because GPS has documented professional overlap between inspectors and facility staff in small-county settings. High DPH scores at GDC facilities coexist with sustained witness reports of equipment failure and food contamination; the contradiction is the analytical center of GPS's investigation "Dunked, Stacked, and Served." A Coastal State Prison resident's account corroborates the contaminated-tray pattern, as does The Marshall Project's May 16, 2026 investigation of Georgia prison food by Beth Schwartzapfel, "Rats, Insects and Mold," which independently reported rats in kitchens, insects in food, moldy trays, and visible malnutrition across Georgia facilities.

The economics behind the kitchen are documented. GDC spends approximately $1.69 per person per day on food as of 2024 and has proposed $1.60 per day in FY27 — under 60 cents per meal — against the FDA Thrifty Food Plan estimate of roughly $10 per day for an adult man's nutritionally adequate diet. The state spends approximately 14 times more on medical care for incarcerated people, $432 million, than on their food.

Staffing, Lockdowns, and the DOJ Findings

The October 2024 DOJ findings letter concluded that "the leadership of the Georgia Department of Corrections has lost control of its facilities" and faulted GDC for placing "too much blame on gangs and insufficient emphasis on understaffing." Officer vacancies across Georgia's prisons have run between 49.3 and 60 percent systemwide for multiple years against a national standard of no more than 10 percent; at Valdosta State Prison the rate reached 80 percent by April 2024. Georgia ranks last of 50 states for correctional-officer pay, the hiring pipeline cannot close the gap, and 82.7 percent of new hires leave in their first year. DOJ and the Guidehouse 2024 assessment independently concluded that gangs effectively run multiple facilities, controlling access to phones, showers, food, and bed assignments.

WTOC's February 2026 reporting brought those systemwide findings down to Coastal. The station reported that lockdowns at the facility prevent inmates from attending classes and programs needed to earn Performance Incentive Credits for early parole eligibility. It reported that inmates were subjected to lockdowns lasting seven to ten days without shower access, and that the DOJ report criticized Georgia prisons including Coastal State for overusing lockdowns and isolation, particularly on victims of sexual abuse. It reported that GDC records show no correctional officers were disciplined for violence against inmates over a six-month period in 2025, despite employees saying such violence is common. It reported allegations that staff withhold food from inmates as punishment — including not waking sleeping inmates for meal calls and then denying them food — and allegations that some correctional officers brutally beat inmates regularly, with one employee describing hearing screams during their walk to work. Workers described crumbling infrastructure and unsanitary conditions: black mold throughout housing units, rat and mice infestations, and frequent air conditioning and heating failures. WTOC separately obtained maintenance records from Coastal covering May to November 2025 showing over $5,000 spent on pest control; the Department of Corrections said it had no records related to mold remediation.

The same outlet reported that a federal judge in Georgia's Middle District scolded Commissioner Tyrone Oliver for "failure to comply with court orders" and asked whether GDC "deems itself above the law." A 2024 U.S. Department of Justice investigation found Georgia prisons, including Coastal State, failing to protect inmates from violence, neglect, and unconstitutional conditions, concluding that GDC violates the Eighth Amendment. GPS has separately documented that sexual violence in GDC facilities is systemic — DOJ concluded in October 2024 that sexual assault is "rampant" and that GDC does not reasonably protect incarcerated people, including LGBTI individuals, from sexual harm; of 456 sexual-abuse allegations recorded in 2022, only 35 were substantiated.

GPS records show that over the past twelve months, staffing-shortage reports at this facility have been logged across multiple sources at critical and high severity, alongside repeated family-safety concerns, allegations of staff misconduct, and assault allegations. GPS has received recurring accounts of use-of-force incidents and of an in-custody death at Coastal. These are receipt acknowledgments, not verified findings.

Heat, Housing, and Medical Care

Family accounts collected by GPS describe a facility where the air conditioning has been inoperable for months, where fans are used as a substitute, and where some incarcerated people suffer heat exhaustion and breathing difficulty as a result. GPS records show inadequate-climate signals at this facility across multiple sources at high severity over the past year. Multiple family members report that medical help is slow to respond, with waits of 35 to 50 minutes, and that medical staff are unavailable on weekends. GPS has received recurring accounts of medical neglect at Coastal — including abrupt discontinuation of prescribed medications, a chronic condition that staff allegedly told an incarcerated person he no longer had, and blood sugar levels left unmonitored. GPS has additionally received accounts of hormone therapy disruption at this facility, including missed estradiol injections and a taper off treatment.

A separate thread concerns disability accommodation. GPS has received accounts of a wheelchair-dependent incarcerated person housed in an upstairs segregation cell at Coastal, with other incarcerated people reportedly carrying the man and his chair up the stairs while a corrections officer watched. GPS has not corroborated the account; the subject's identity, the officer's identity, and the basis for the segregation placement were not provided. GPS records show due-process-violation signals at this facility across multiple sources over the past year.

The physical plant matters here. The facility's 74-bed segregation unit and its four open-bay dormitories are the two housing types most often implicated in accounts GPS receives. GPS's internal analysis has identified a pattern at Coastal in which dormitories were secured with bolt, clamp, and padlock hardware, consistent with a restraint pattern documented in separate GPS case files. Multiple family members report that dorms at the facility are padlocked and that padlocked housing units hold incarcerated people of different security levels, including non-violent individuals — a classification-drift concern that GPS has documented systemwide.

A Facility in the System's Crosshairs

Coastal is not an isolated case, and the systemwide context is what makes its numbers legible. GPS has independently tracked 1,896 deaths in GDC custody since 2020. The DOJ investigation found Georgia's in-prison homicide rate nearly eight times the national average, with 333 total deaths in GDC custody in 2024 — the deadliest year in state history. Approximately 31 percent of the system's roughly 49,000 incarcerated population are validated members of 315 different security threat groups, more than double the national average.

The gang violence that has driven those numbers has erupted elsewhere in the system, not at Coastal. On January 11, 2026, four people died in a gang-related disturbance at Washington State Prison — Teddy Dewayne Jackson, 27; Ahmod Dewayne Hatcher, 23; and Jimmy Lee Trammell, 42, who was days from release, all killed at the scene, and Silas Rodrigioeuz Westbrook, 42, who was injured that day and died January 17 after his release from the hospital. Dajhmere Ladaveon Hall, 30, had been found dead at Washington two days before the riot. Washington State Prison was placed on continuous lockdown after the brawl and never reopened. Roughly three months later, twelve inmates were charged with felony murder, aggravated assault, and gang participation in connection with the disturbance. Three days after the riot, Washington State Prison officer Adriana Carnelio, 27, was arrested by the GBI and the Ocmulgee Drug Task Force on cocaine and methamphetamine possession with intent to distribute and firearms charges, with a co-defendant identified as Q. Peacock. Those events belong to Washington State Prison, not to Coastal — but they are the system that Coastal belongs to, and the staffing and gang-control failures DOJ documented are the same ones operating in Chatham County.

At Coastal, the record since 2020 is one of sustained mortality, a kitchen that failed inspection badly in April 2026 and passed narrowly in July, litigation over a broken cell lock, and a stream of accounts from families and incarcerated people describing heat, hunger, untreated illness, and violence. The state has paid out more than $970,000 in liability settlements tied to this facility across five documented cases. The warden who inherited that record, David Stokes, took the post on June 1, 2026.

Sources

This analysis draws on Georgia Department of Public Health food-safety inspection records for Coastal State Prison; the Georgia Department of Administrative Services Risk Management settlement ledger obtained through open records; civil complaints filed in the deaths of Kion E. Parks and Rufus Ramon Lee as reported by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution; reporting by WTOC, The Georgia Virtue, WALB, and The Marshall Project; the October 2024 U.S. Department of Justice findings letter on Georgia prisons; the 2024 Guidehouse GDC assessment; and GPS's own mortality registry, systemic findings, and intelligence records, including accounts collected from incarcerated people and their families.