Atlanta prison guard pleads not guilty in federal excessive force case
An Atlanta federal prison guard was arraigned Thursday on federal charges of using excessive force against an inmate and writing a false incident report to justify it.
On March 17 of last year, Justin Newkirk, 35, of Locust Grove, allegedly sprayed a U.S. Penitentiary Atlanta inmate with pepper spray without legal justification and then wrote a false report saying the inmate had lunged at him with a closed fist, according to the U.S. Justice Department.
Newkirk has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
The U.S. Penitentiary Atlanta is located on McDonough Boulevard near Grant Park and houses low-security male inmates.
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Jeremy Redmon is an award-winning journalist, essayist and educator with more than three decades of experience reporting for newspapers.
