Graham, Michael

Tenure Summary

Michael Graham’s GDC career begins in the structured records as a corrections officer at Burruss Correctional Training Center in 2015, followed by CSM correctional lieutenant posts from 2016 through 2018. In 2019 he was a correctional unit manager at Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison. Graham moved into facility leadership as deputy warden at Dooly State Prison for 2020 and 2021, then served as deputy warden at Central State Prison from 2022 until July 15, 2025. On July 16, 2025, he became warden at Autry State Prison, a position he still held as of the latest records.

GPS records attribute 37 deaths to the facilities where Graham held these leadership postings: 12 at Dooly State Prison, 20 at Central State Prison, and 5 at Autry State Prison. GPS records do not attribute deaths to his earlier Burruss or Georgia Diagnostic postings. The dataset lists no lawsuits naming Graham as a defendant.

What happened on their watch

Dooly State Prison — Deputy Warden, 2020–2021

GPS records attribute 12 deaths at Dooly during Graham’s tenure as deputy warden. The sampled deaths cluster in 2020 and 2021. Several of the Dooly death records carry cause coding that the UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project obtained from GDC through an open records request; GDC coded deaths such as David Hunter, Charles Busbee, Luckie Odis Miller, Andrew Harris, Nathaniel Troy Jr., Michael Terry, Glenn Whorton, Shelton Donaldson, Kenneth Hicks, Terry Mintz, and Charles Blassingame as “Natural.” James Robb Yarbrough, 46, died August 14, 2020; GDC coded that death “Undetermined” in the same dataset. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution later reported that Yarbrough had suffered from uncontrolled diabetes for months at Dooly and died of ketoacidosis in a case alleging medical malpractice.

Central State Prison — Deputy Warden, 2022–2025

GPS records attribute 20 deaths at Central State Prison during Graham’s tenure there. The sampled records include multiple homicides documented by outside reporting. Marquis L. Johnson, 26, died December 18, 2023; the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported the cause as a stab wound to the chest, and a DOJ report cited by the AJC states Johnson was stabbed in the prison barbershop on December 8 and later died after cardiac arrest secondary to the stabbing. Hollis Alan Bryant, 28, died December 17, 2023; the AJC reported sharp force trauma to the left femoral artery, and the DOJ report cited by the AJC states Bryant was stabbed to death and three other prisoners were criminally charged. Leon Culver Kelly, 47, died December 9, 2024; 13WMAZ reported the coroner confirmed multiple stab wounds.

The Central records also include deaths with less specific cause coding. For example, Matthew Maddox, who died January 28, 2025, appears in GDC’s January 2025 mortality data with the cause listed as “Cerebral Herniation due to Extremely High BP.” During Graham’s Central tenure, Georgia Public Broadcasting reported severe staff shortages that allowed gang members to effectively run Georgia prisons and left families without information after in-custody deaths. 13WMAZ separately reported that in March 2025 three former Central State Prison guards were accused of beating an inmate and attempting a cover-up.

Autry State Prison — Warden, July 2025–present

GPS records attribute five deaths at Autry State Prison during Graham’s warden tenure. The sampled records identify Alton Anson Kelly, 61, and James Melvin Tudor, 86, on August 23, 2025; Richard Merritt, 75, on October 20, 2025; Chaudhry Abdul Rashid, 74, on November 11, 2025; and Richard Cleveland Castleberry, 72, on April 23, 2026. GPS records list cause category 6 for each of these Autry deaths and provide no narrative annotation. The structured records include no news mentions or facility-specific intel reports tied to Autry for these deaths.

Sources

• GPS personnel and custodial mortality records
• Atlanta Journal-Constitution — Georgia Prison Homicides Investigation and reporting on DOJ findings at Central State Prison
• Georgia Public Broadcasting — December 2023 reporting on Georgia prison deaths and staffing shortages
• 13WMAZ — Central State Prison homicide and guard misconduct reporting
• UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project custodial mortality dataset — GDC coding obtained via open records request for 2015–2021 Dooly deaths
• GDC-released January 2025 mortality data, as reflected in GPS records

Synthesized by GPS Intelligence System on Aug 23, 2026 from positions, attributed deaths, lawsuits, intel reports, and news mentions in the public corpus. The supporting data tables follow below.