Garner Inmate Death Ruled Suicide

A Garner Correctional Institution inmate committed suicide in the state’s high-security prison on Nunnawauk Road late on the night of May 21, authorities said.

A spokeswoman for the Chief State Medical Examiner’s office said May 23 that the results of an autopsy indicated that inmate Andre Mario Lyle, 22, whose last known address was East Hartford, died due to asphyxia caused by neck compression resulting from suicide.

At 11:04 pm on May 21, a state Department of Correction (DOC) correction officer saw Lyle linked to a bed sheet connected to the top bunk railing in his locked single-occupancy cell, according to DOC.

“Upon discovery, an immediate on-site medical response was initiated, whereupon emergency medical services transported the inmate by ambulance to a local area hospital. At 11:55 pm, Mr Lyle was pronounced deceased by a physician at Danbury Hospital,” according to DOC.

The DOC and state police investigated the incident.

State police spokesman Lieutenant J. Paul Vance said that when he was found, Lyle was in his cell alone. No foul play is suspected in the case, Lt Vance said.

While he was incarcerated at Garner, Lyle was being held as an unsentenced inmate on $150,000 bail on a controlling pending criminal charge of carrying a dangerous weapon. He had been in prison since April 14.

Lyle had 14 charges pending against him, including four felonies, in Manchester Superior Court.

Since 1998, 44 DOC inmates have committed suicide while incarcerated in DOC facilities. Lyle is the fifth Garner inmate to have committed suicide since 2000.