A man serving a murder and kidnapping sentence in the state's maximum security prison was found dead Thursday afternoon in an apparent suicide, according to a Friday evening news release from the Department of Corrections.
Staff on Thursday afternoon noticed Jason Lee Taylor, 38, unresponsive in a locked single-person cell in the Maximum Security Unit in Tucker.
Taylor was pronounced dead in the prison infirmary just after 4:30 p.m., the release stated. It did not list the cause of Taylor's death, simply saying that authorities think it was a suicide.
Arkansas State Police are investigating the death, and the Department of Corrections will also lead an internal investigation into the incident.
Taylor was serving a 50-year sentence out of Saline County for the 2008 first-degree murder and kidnapping of Derrick Utsey.