UTICA, N.Y. — A former corrections officer was sentenced Monday to 15 years in prison for his role in the killing of a Black inmate whose beating by multiple guards at an upstate New York prison was caught on bodycam video, according to published news media reports.
Christopher Walrath, 36, was among six guards charged with murder in the Dec. 9 death of Robert Brooks at Marcy Correctional Facility. He pleaded guilty in May to first-degree manslaughter — the first to take a plea deal in the case.
“In that video, I see you and your fellow officers treating him as if his life had no value, as if you were entitled to brutalize him for sport,” Brooks’ son told the court.
“I am not OK, and I never will be,” he said in his statement.
Other guards are being prosecuted in the fatal beating of Messiah Nantwi on March 1 at another Marcy lockup, the Mid-State Correctional Facility. Ten guards were indicted in April, including two who are charged with murder.
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