Williams, Khalilah J

Tenure Summary

Khalilah J. Williams entered Georgia Department of Corrections as a behavioral health counselor in 2015 and served as a behavioral health counselor supervisor in 2016. GPS records show Williams became deputy warden at Dodge State Prison in 2017 and held that role through the latest listed records into 2026, with salary rising from $49,323.01 in 2017 to $72,089.62 in 2025.

GPS records attribute 16 deaths to the Dodge State Prison deputy warden tenure held by Williams, all at Dodge State Prison. No lawsuits naming Williams as a defendant appear in the provided records. A May 2025 state liability settlement of $16,000 tied to Dodge State Prison appears in a Georgia Department of Administrative Services ledger.

What happened on their watch

Dodge State Prison — Deputy Warden (2017–2026)

All 16 death records provided for this tenure were logged with Williams holding the deputy warden role at Dodge State Prison. According to Dodge County Coroner records obtained through open records, the detailed death records span Aug. 17, 2020, through April 28, 2026.

A cluster of five deaths occurred between Aug. 17 and Oct. 9, 2020, according to coroner records: Cantrell Lavar Edge, 41; Caesar Dupree, 64; Tadrick Terrian Osborne, 40; William D. Hughes, 61; and Kenneth Lockett, 57. Three of those coroner records note COVID-19; the others list hypertensive, cardiac, pulmonary, or renal disease.

Two 2022 deaths are documented as homicide-related. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Georgia Prison Homicides Investigation lists Hezekiah Sha'Nard Cuyler, 21, as dying Sept. 14, 2022, from blunt force trauma to the head; the Dodge County coroner records the manner as homicide following a fight on Aug. 31, 2022. The AJC also lists Douglas Anthony Forts, 57, as dying June 2, 2022, from acute traumatic amputation of a finger during a fight; the coroner form left manner blank, while GPS records classify the death as homicide in an in-custody assault context.

Coroner records classify three deaths as suicides by hanging: Charles Dennis Casey, 41, on May 6, 2023; John August Comer, 33, on Sept. 9, 2023, with the coroner marking manner pending but circumstances as self-hanging and noting known mental-health history; and Kenneth Brown, 58, on Jan. 31, 2024.

Other deaths in the file include Hoke Smith Tarpley, 57, diabetic ketoacidosis on Aug. 7, 2021; Stewart Myles Mitchell, 36, on Dec. 7, 2021, classified by GDC as undetermined in a dataset obtained by the UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project; Arnold Merle McDonald, 63, on Dec. 22, 2022, after a fall and subdural hematoma with coroner manner left blank; Sotero Uriquiza-Hernandez, 51, on May 20, 2025, after collapsing with low back pain; and Joseph Chatfield, 62, on June 13, 2025, with cause left blank pending toxicology. Warren Peacock, 70, was pronounced dead April 28, 2026; coroner records note chronic hypertension, kidney disease, COPD, and diabetes with pending autopsy and toxicology, though a GBI open-records response later said no records were located.

The Georgia DOAS Risk Management settlement ledger records a $16,000 payout to Kimyania Smith on May 26, 2025, tied to a 2025 incident at Dodge State Prison.

Sources

• GPS personnel and mortality records — position history, death attribution totals, and per-facility counts.
• Dodge County Coroner open-records response, June 30, 2026 — death classifications, circumstances, and ages at Dodge State Prison.
• Atlanta Journal-Constitution Georgia Prison Homicides Investigation — deaths of Hezekiah Sha'Nard Cuyler and Douglas Anthony Forts.
• UCLA Law Behind Bars Data Project custodial mortality dataset, obtained from GDC via open records — GDC classification of Stewart Myles Mitchell’s death as undetermined.
• Georgia Department of Administrative Services Risk Management settlement ledger via open records — Kimyania Smith $16,000 payout tied to Dodge State Prison.
• GBI Division of Forensic Sciences open-records response — no responsive records located for Warren Peacock.

Synthesized by GPS Intelligence System on Aug 30, 2026 from positions, attributed deaths, lawsuits, intel reports, and news mentions in the public corpus. The supporting data tables follow below.