{"id":139524,"date":"2026-01-19T00:53:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-19T00:53:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/139524\/"},"modified":"2026-01-19T00:53:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-19T00:53:12","slug":"investigation-underway-after-inmate-death-at-fresno-county-prison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/139524\/","title":{"rendered":"Investigation underway after inmate death at Fresno County prison"},"content":{"rendered":"

COALINGA, Calif. (FOX26) \u2014 California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation officials are investigating the death of an inmate on Saturday.<\/p>\n

Pleasant Valley State Prison staff responded to an incident inside one of the dorm rooms involving inmates Brion E. Spidle, Jorge Ortega, and Victor Wence a bit after 2 p.m.<\/p>\n

Spidle was found unconscious after being knocked to the ground.<\/p>\n

Despite immediate life-saving measures, Spidle succumbed to his injuries and was pronounced dead at 2:33 p.m. <\/p>\n

No weapon was recovered, and no staff or additional inmates were injured. <\/p>\n

Officers identified Ortega and Wence as the suspected assailants and secured them without incident.<\/p>\n

They were placed in restricted housing pending an investigation.<\/p>\n

The Office of the Inspector General was notified, and the Fresno County coroner will determine Spidle\u2019s official cause of death.<\/p>\n

[RELATED] Gang-related shooting suspects arrested in Tulare County<\/a><\/p>\n

Spindle,41-years-old, was received from Shasta County on June 2, 2025. <\/p>\n

He was sentenced to four years for corporal injury on specific persons resulting in a traumatic condition.<\/p>\n

Ortega, 51-years-old, was received from Stanislaus County on Feb. 20, 2025.<\/p>\n

He was sentenced to six years for assault with force likely to produce great bodily injury as a second striker and vehicle theft as a second striker.<\/p>\n

Wence, 43-year-old, was received from Los Angeles County on Feb. 16, 2023. <\/p>\n

He was sentenced to 10 years for second-degree robbery as a second striker.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"COALINGA, Calif. (FOX26) \u2014 California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation officials are investigating the death of an inmate…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":139525,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":{"0":"post-139524","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fresno","8":"tag-fresno","9":"tag-fresno-headlines","10":"tag-fresno-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139524","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139524"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139524\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139525"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139524"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139524"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139524"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}