Graham, Michael

Tenure Summary

Michael Graham began his Georgia Department of Corrections career as a correctional officer at Burruss Correctional Training Center in 2015. He advanced through supervisory roles — lieutenant and unit manager — before holding deputy warden posts at Dooly State Prison (2020–2021) and Central State Prison (2022–2025). In July 2025, Graham was promoted to warden of Autry State Prison. GPS records attribute a total of 37 in-custody deaths to the facilities where Graham served in leadership roles: 12 at Dooly, 20 at Central, and 5 at Autry. Though Graham is not personally named in any federal civil rights lawsuit, his deputy-warden and warden tenures coincided with documented systemic crises — severe overcrowding, a statewide officer vacancy rate near 50 percent, and repeated violent deaths inside the prisons he helped oversee.

What happened on their watch

Dooly State Prison — Deputy Warden (January 2020 – December 2021)
GPS records show 12 people died at Dooly while Graham was deputy warden. Every listed cause is recorded as unknown, and the decedents ranged in age from 46 to 73. One of those deaths, James Robb Yarbrough (August 2020), later drew a medical‑malpractice allegation: the Atlanta Journal‑Constitution reported that Yarbrough suffered from uncontrolled diabetes and died of ketoacidosis after his treatment was allegedly neglected. No direct allegations of misconduct were leveled at Graham in connection with the deaths. During this period, Dooly was operating well beyond its original 750‑person design capacity; a later report would note it held 1,593 people while staffing shortages averaged 50 percent statewide. That context frames what the GDC itself would later describe as a facility struggling with gang‑related violence and contraband trafficking — patterns that became visible after Graham’s departure.

Central State Prison — Deputy Warden (January 2022 – July 2025)
During Graham’s three‑and‑a‑half‑year tenure as deputy warden, 20 people died at Central State Prison. Three were homicides:

• Hollis Alan Bryant (28), stabbed December 17, 2023, died of sharp‑force trauma to his left femoral artery, according to the Atlanta Journal‑Constitution’s homicide investigation.
• Marquis Lamar Johnson (26), stabbed in the prison barbershop on December 8, 2023, died after cardiac arrest secondary to the stabbing, per the same AJC investigation.
• Leon Culver Kelly (47), stabbed to death December 9, 2024; the coroner confirmed multiple stab wounds, a death reported by 13WMAZ.

Beyond the homicides, two facility‑level incidents attracted outside scrutiny while Graham was deputy warden. In March 2025, 13WMAZ reported that three former Central State guards were accused of beating an inmate and attempting a cover‑up. In June 2025, three inmates were charged with stabbing another prisoner. Broader patterns were documented during Graham’s time: Georgia Public Broadcasting warned in late 2023 that severe staff shortages had allowed gangs to effectively run state prisons, and that families of people who died were routinely left without information.

Autry State Prison — Warden (July 2025 – present)
Since taking command of Autry State Prison on July 16, 2025, Graham has presided over five in‑custody deaths as of April 2026. All are recorded with unknown causes. The decedents were aged 61 to 86: Alton Anson Kelly (61) and James Melvin Tudor (86) died on the same day in August 2025; Richard Merritt (75) in October 2025; Chaudhry Abudl Rashid (74) in November 2025; and Richard Cleveland Castleberry (72) in April 2026. No lawsuits or staff‑misconduct allegations directly tied to Graham’s warden role appear in the GPS intelligence record.

Sources

• GPS personnel and mortality records — position history, death counts, and decedent data.
• Atlanta Journal‑Constitution — homicide reporting on Hollis Alan Bryant and Marquis L. Johnson at Central SP; medical‑malpractice allegation concerning James Yarbrough at Dooly SP; broader prison‑crisis coverage.
• 13WMAZ — confirmation of Leon Culver Kelly’s homicide at Central SP; coverage of guard‑misconduct and inmate‑stabbing incidents at Central SP.
• Georgia Public Broadcasting — reporting on staff shortages, gang control, and family notification failures during Graham’s Central SP tenure.
• GDC official mortuary reports — cause of death for Matthew Maddox (January 2025) utilized in the GPS dataset.

Synthesized by GPS Intelligence System on Aug 2, 2026 from positions, attributed deaths, lawsuits, intel reports, and news mentions in the public corpus. The supporting data tables follow below.