Officials with the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation are investigating the death of an incarcerated man at Salinas Valley State Prison in Soledad as a homicide, authorities announced Wednesday.
According to the CDCR, the incident occurred around 5:15 p.m. on Oct. 14, when correctional staff witnessed inmate Orlando M. Ochoa assaulting another incarcerated person, Israel M. Mendoza. Officers immediately intervened, deploying chemical agents to stop the attack and restrain Ochoa, officials said.
Staff members began life-saving efforts on Mendoza and called 911. He was transported to the prison’s triage and treatment area, where paramedics pronounced him dead at 5:52 p.m., according to the CDCR.
Ochoa, 40, was moved to restricted housing while the prison’s Investigative Services Unit looks into the incident. The Office of the Inspector General has been notified, and the Monterey County Coroner’s Office will determine Mendoza’s official cause of death.
Mendoza, also 40, had been incarcerated at Salinas Valley since December 2015. He was received from Yolo County to serve a 14-year sentence for corporal injury on a specific person within seven years of a prior conviction and false imprisonment with violence as a second striker, according to CDCR records.
Ochoa was received from San Bernardino County in February 2006 to serve five years for second-degree robbery. In 2009, he was additionally sentenced in Los Angeles County to 32 years for voluntary manslaughter and second-degree robbery, also as a second striker, officials said.
Salinas Valley State Prison houses approximately 2,400 incarcerated people across various custody levels and employs about 1,500 staff members, according to the CDCR.
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