- Daniel Williams was an inmate serving a year-long sentence before his recent death in custody.
- His father believes he was beaten and sexually assaulted by other inmates.
Twenty-two-year-old Daniel Terry Williams should be at home with his family right now after being released from an Alabama correctional facility.
Instead, his family is reeling as they try to find what led to his death on November 9 after what the Alabama Department of Corrections said was a "possible inmate-on-inmate assault," per CNN.
He was due to be released the same day he was taken off life support, reported Fox News.
Daniel Williams, who was serving one year for a property theft conviction, was taken to a health care unit after jail officials at the Staton Correctional Facility found him unresponsive in his cell, per CNN. The incident was reported by the correctional facility on October 22.
Terry Williams, his father, said he was informed his son was in the hospital because of a drug overdose on October 25, per CNN.
But when his father, stepmother, and girlfriend went to see him, they were appalled by what they saw.
"He had bruises all up and down his body, cuts, he had indentations in his head. It looked like they took a mop handle or something and beat him across the head with it. He was in bad shape," Terry Williams told CNN.
Doctors told his family Daniel Williams had lost 90% of brain function.
Terry Williams said that a person in the same jail told him three other inmates beat and sexually assaulted Daniel Williams, per NBC News.
His attorney, Andrew Menefee, told CNN he requested a rape kit for Daniel Williams and believes he was sexually assaulted.
"We were hearing that in comments from nurses and doctors at the hospital who described seeing bruising on the inside of Daniel's legs," Menefee said to CNN. "They said his skin was just black with bruises, they had never seen so much bruising, and they said it was obvious that he had been sexually assaulted and raped."
Menefee said he has not yet received the test results.
Daniel Williams was a father to two young children.
The Alabama Department of Corrections told CNN its Law Enforcement Services Division was investigating Williams' death and the circumstances surrounding it.