McAlister, Christopher A

Tenure Summary

Christopher A. McAlister’s GDC career began with a corrections officer posting in 2015, followed by lieutenant in 2016 and unit manager roles from 2017 through 2020. GPS records list no facility for those early postings. Starting January 1, 2021, he held the deputy warden role at Hays State Prison, with records running through December 31, 2025, plus a single-day deputy warden entry dated August 27, 2026. GPS records attribute 33 deaths to Hays State Prison during McAlister’s deputy-warden tenure. Those deaths include multiple homicides documented through coroner files and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s prison-homicides investigation, natural deaths, and deaths for which the extract provides no cause detail. Two lawsuits are associated with his tenure in GPS records. During part of his time at Hays, McAlister served under Warden Joshua Jones, who died unexpectedly on July 4, 2026, according to a published obituary.

What happened on their watch

Hays State Prison — Deputy Warden (2021 onward)

From 2021, the AJC’s Georgia Prison Homicides Investigation documented fatal stabbings at Hays: Jorge Ventura in 2021 (stab wounds to neck, torso, and upper extremities), Quintez Smith in 2022 (multiple sharp force injuries), Talore Blackford in 2023 (multiple stab wounds of the neck), Jeremy Price in 2024 (stab wounds to neck and chest), and Freddie Talley in 2024 (stab wound to chest); GPS records also note that seven weapons were recovered after Talley’s death. In 2025, the Chattooga County Coroner’s file for James Cannon listed manner as homicide; the coroner’s notes state that the warden reported Cannon’s cellmate confessed to manually strangling him, and that Cannon had a documented fight with the cellmate within the prior two weeks. In 2026, Melvin Johnson’s coroner file lists multiple sharp force injuries and manner homicide; notes say he was found unresponsive in an open dorm holding 64 people and that no suspect or weapon was located. Telegram reports flagged by GPS also allege a person identified as KG was killed at Hays during an inspection on April 1, 2026, with additional victims reported.

The records also include natural deaths. Corey Dubose’s 2026 coroner file lists acute myocardial infarction due to diabetes mellitus, manner natural. Raymont Farley’s 2025 file lists epilepsy as cause, natural manner; the coroner noted two packets of daily medications on the cell floor. Tommy Joe Strickland’s 2025 file lists AIDS with contributing fungal meningitis, natural manner. GDC’s own coding in the UCLA Law Behind Bars dataset classified Mason Babbage’s 2021 death as accidental and Casuasdas Thomas’s 2021 death as natural.

Intelligence and media reports from the period describe broader concerns. The AJC reported that Tammy Price alleged GDC was omitting manner-of-death information from mortality reports. A family report published to a Georgia prison family group alleged that men held in strip cells in the Hays infirmary were barred from phone calls and visits during a 2024 suicidal food-refusal crisis; GPS stated it had not established whether that restriction was written policy, local procedure, or informal practice. The same source credited Warden Joshua Jones with personally intervening to keep the man alive. Court and media records also note that former Hays Lieutenant Lakeshia Thomas pleaded guilty in April 2022 to arranging to smuggle marijuana for a gang member, and in February 2025 federal officials announced a former Hays guard was sentenced for smuggling methamphetamine to inmates for over a month. During McAlister’s tenure, Georgia announced a $24 million hardened 126-bed unit at Hays in 2025, part of a $600 million prison spending surge, per GPS-tracked policy changes.

Litigation

• Mckenzie v. Oliver, No. 4:26-cv-00108, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia (GAND), filed April 28, 2026 — pending.
• Daker v. Oliver Filing Restriction Per 59 Order, No. 1:25-cv-03191, GAND, filed June 6, 2025 — terminated March 30, 2026.

Sources

• GPS personnel and mortality records, including Chattooga County Coroner death-investigation files obtained via GPS open-records requests.
• Atlanta Journal-Constitution — Georgia Prison Homicides Investigation; AJC reporting on contraband smuggling and death-information access.
• Coosa Valley News — reporting on James Cannon’s death at Hays State Prison.
• CourtListener — dockets for Mckenzie v. Oliver and Daker v. Oliver.
• Facebook public comments in a Georgia prison family group — family reports about Hays infirmary strip-cell conditions and Warden Joshua Jones.
• Published obituary for Warden Joshua Jones.
• UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project custodial mortality dataset — GDC classifications for 2015–2021 deaths.

Synthesized by GPS Intelligence System on Sep 6, 2026 from positions, attributed deaths, lawsuits, intel reports, and news mentions in the public corpus. The supporting data tables follow below.