Inmate dies after fight at California State Prison, Sacramento; murder investigation underway

FOLSOM – The death of an incarcerated man at California's Sacramento State Prison in Folsom is being investigated as a homicide following a fight Thursday, officials said Saturday.

Around 3 p.m. on Thursday, six men began fighting in a recreation room. The next day, 40-year-old Darryl Hudson died Friday evening at an outside medical facility, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said.

Officials said Hudson got into a fight with Darryn Mayberry, Robert Keller, Tray Watson, Marcell Battiest and Otis Wyatt. They said Mayberry allegedly hit Hudson several times, causing him to lose consciousness.

Hudson was picked up from Contra Costa County in late 2009 and was serving a life sentence for first-degree murder and robbery. Then in May 2021, Kern County sentenced him to seven years in prison for assault on a non-prisoner.

Mayberry, 30, was sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2018 for second-degree robbery as a second offender.

Keller, 38, was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole in 2007 for first-degree murder and attempted first-degree murder. He was then convicted again of several other offenses, including assault with a deadly weapon in prison.

Watson, 58, was sentenced to 18 years in prison in 2004 for assault with a firearm. He was then convicted again of two misdemeanors in prison.

Battiest, 29, was arrested in February in Sonoma County on charges of second-degree murder and second-degree robbery.

Wyatt, 27, was convicted of second-degree murder and manslaughter. He was taken out of Alameda County in January.

The five men have been placed in a gated community while the investigation continues. The medical examiner will determine Hudson's official cause of death.

The California State Prison, Sacramento is a maximum security prison in Folsom that houses 1,990 inmates and employs approximately 1,700 people.