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An incarcerated man at St. Clair Correctional Facility died in hospice care on Sunday, according to a spokesperson for the Alabama Department of Corrections.
Charles Eugene Fortenberry, 74, who was serving a life sentence at the St. Clair County facility for a murder committed in Calhoun County and who was under hospice care at the facility, was “observed in respiratory distress” by the health care staff at the prison on Sunday.
Staff attempted life-saving measures on Fortenberry but were unsuccessful, the spokesperson said, and he was later pronounced deceased.
As with all cases of death in Alabama’s prison system, the Alabama Department of Correction’s Law Enforcement Services Division is investigating the circumstances surrounding Fortenberry’s death, with a formal cause of death pending an official autopsy.
According to the latest corrections statistics released from the ADOC, the St. Clair County facility, which is a close security institution originally opened in 1983, has seen at least 20 deaths among its incarcerated population over a year-long period ending in June.
At least three, including Fortenberry, have died in the facility since June, according to prior statements from the ADOC.
