McDay, Courtney

Tenure Summary

Courtney McDay's GDC career began in behavioral-health counseling: state salary records list her as a behavioral health counselor from 2015 through 2021, rising from $33,274.80 to $38,142.38, with no facility assignment recorded in those years. In 2022 she moved into facility leadership as Deputy Warden at Phillips State Prison, a post the records show her holding continuously through 2026, with pay climbing from $57,780.82 (2022) to $74,324.91 (2025). Effective September 1, 2026, she is listed as Superintendent of Arrendale Transitional Center, with no end date recorded.

Across her leadership tenures, 49 deaths are attributed to Phillips State Prison — the entire total recorded against her. During her deputy wardenship the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's prison-homicide list carried two allegations tied to Phillips, and a federal lawsuit, Wright v. McDay, was filed against her in the Northern District of Georgia in September 2023 and remains pending with no recorded outcome.

What happened on their watch

Phillips State Prison — Deputy Warden, 2022–2026. All 49 deaths attributed to McDay's leadership occurred at Phillips during this period. The records' capped sample of named decedents runs from June 11, 2022 (Jamal Cymonne Johnson, 32) through November 8, 2025 (Justin Curtis Kinsey, 37), spanning ages 18 to 86 — the youngest in the sample being Thomas Lane Dean (18, April 2024) and Jacob Kendall Daniels (18, August 2022), the oldest John Carlsyle Neale (86, February 2024).

For several deaths the records carry documented cause findings: Johnson (32) died of stab wounds to the head injuring the brain, with delayed effects; Sidney Sanchez Nealey (22) of stab wounds to the torso; Daniels (19) of a stab wound to the neck, shoulder and arm; Alim Rasheed Lovett (33) of stab wounds to the back injuring the right lung, with an incident report listing four other prisoners involved; Arthur James Wimbush Jr. (46) of blunt force trauma with fracture of the thyroid cartilage; and David Fambro (69) of complications of facial fractures after a 26-day interval, which incident-report data classifies as a homicide. For most other sample entries the records give only a numeric cause category with no published narrative.

The most extensively documented death is that of Quafabian Melik McBride, 19, who died September 30, 2022 of stab wounds to the chest injuring the heart during a gang-related fight in the lockdown unit. The records state McBride had been brought to lockdown that day through arrangements made by officers, and that the DOJ found the killing triggered a gang war across multiple GDC prisons, with Bloods attacking Crips over the following days and 20 prisoners hospitalized.

Two allegations from the AJC's prison-homicide list, published January 21, 2025, are logged against Phillips with McDay's role given as Deputy Warden: that Dave Stone was assaulted in a mental-health ward, apparently with two pipes wrapped in cloth, resulting in brain death; and that officers arranged for McBride to be brought to the lockdown unit on the day he was killed.

Other records indexed to Phillips during her deputy tenure include, dated April 6, 2025, the killing of a probation violator at Jackson State Prison, and a May 17, 2025 cluster of items concerning Jason Palmer — a wrongful-conviction claim and allegations of inhumane conditions including segregation, food denial and a communications blockade — whose titles reference Telfair State Prison.

Arrendale Transitional Center — Superintendent, from September 1, 2026. Records list McDay in this post with no end date. No deaths are attributed to this tenure.

Litigation

• Wright v. McDay, No. 1:23-cv-04358, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, filed September 25, 2023. McDay is named as a defendant; the docket shows the case pending, with no recorded disposition or settlement amount. The records do not state the allegations in the complaint.

Sources

• Atlanta Journal-Constitution, "Ga. prison homicides: a list of those killed in Georgia's prison system" (published Jan. 21, 2025) — allegations concerning Dave Stone and Quafabian McBride at Phillips State Prison.
• U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia — docket 1:23-cv-04358 (Wright v. McDay), via CourtListener.
• U.S. Department of Justice findings, as cited in the incident records on the McBride killing and the gang war that followed.
• GPS incident records for Phillips State Prison deaths, June 2022–November 2025.
• Georgia Department of Corrections position and salary records, 2015–2026.

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