Lincoln Co. man stabbed to death at Hancock State Prison

Published 1:00 pm Saturday, February 6, 2021

SPARTA, Ga. — The death of a 29-year-old Lincoln County man, who had been incarcerated at Hancock State Prison near Sparta, was the victim of murder earlier this year, The Union-Recorder has learned.

Ocmulgee Judicial Circuit District Attorney T. Wright Barksdale III confirmed the stabbing was a murder.

The victim’s cellmate has been arrested and charged with multiple criminal offenses stemming from the slaying.  

Local and state authorities had not previously released any information about the man’s death.

The victim was identified as Rashad Bolton, who was living in Lincoln County before his conviction on child molestation charges in 2016. The case was prosecuted in Carroll County Superior Court in Carrollton.

Bolton was a 2009 graduate of Washington-Wilkes Comprehensive High School and had previously served in the Navy.

He was sentenced in 2016 to 20 years with the first 10 of those years to be served in confinement and the last 10 years to be served on probation, according to Lori Benoit, a spokeswoman with the Georgia Department of Corrections.

Bolton was stabbed to death in his cell sometime between noon and 2 p.m. on Jan. 4, authorities say.

A shank, which is a makeshift weapon commonly used in assaults and killings in prisons, was used as the murder weapon.

Brian Hargrove, assistant special agent in-charge of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation Region 6 Office in Milledgeville, confirmed that a crime scene specialist with the state agency conducted a crime scene investigation.

The case, itself, was solely worked by the Georgia Department of Corrections Criminal Investigations Division.

The newspaper viewed copies of four warrants that subsequently were taken out against the inmate now charged with Bolton’s murder.

The warrants were taken out by Georgia Department of Corrections Special Agent Timothy Konzelman a day after the crime.

Warrants charge Javaris Compton with two counts of felony murder, one count of malice murder, and one count of aggravated assault.

Compton has been transferred from Hancock State Prison to an undisclosed state prison.

Authorities have not disclosed a motive in the slaying.