An investigation has been launched after an inmate was found dead in Rankin County.
The county’s coroner, David Ruth, told WLBT-TV that Alex Deaton was serving time in the Central Mississippi Correctional Facility when officers found him dead inside his cell on Saturday evening.
Deaton had previously pleaded guilty and been sentenced to life for murder, drive-by shooting, and motor vehicle theft. In 2017, he was wanted in connection with two murders and a string of shootings in Mississippi, along with similar crimes in New Mexico and Kansas.
One of the murder victims was his girlfriend, Heather Robinson. The other was a 69-year-old named Brenda Pinter, who was found dead in a church in Neshoba County.
An autopsy is being performed to determine Deaton’s cause of death. The Mississippi Bureau of Investigation has taken over the case, which marks the third reported inmate death this year.
