ESTILL, S.C. — A 50-year-old man will see 10 more years in prison following a violent assault in a South Carolina federal prison.
Investigators said that George Junior Hall was found guilty in late 2021 with "assault with a dangerous weapon with intent to cause injury and assault resulting in serious injuries" - a crime not dissimilar from those that had led to his incarcerations in the past.
Prosecutors said that Hall was finishing a sentence at the Federal Correctional Institution in Estill when the latest attack occurred. Hall used what authorities described as a "lock-in-a-sock" which is a combination lock inside a sock that is then attached to a nylon belt.
Prosecutors, citing video and prison officials, said that Hall came up behind his victim and struck him in the head with the improvised weapon knocking him to the ground. He then hit the victim while he was on the ground.
Prison workers later followed a trail of blood that led them to the victim back in his cell. Prosecutors said he had numerous cuts, a fractured skull, and a subarachnoid hemorrhage near his brain, he also suffered temporary hearing loss and scarring from the attack.
Prosecutors, in announcing Hall's sentence, said that this follows a pattern of violence going back to at least the early 1990s when he was convicted of aggravated assault in 1993 for shooting his brother. He also faced both assault and attempted murder charges for the shooting of a mail carrier in 1996. Authorities said Hall was trying to steal welfare checks.
Those attacks also continued in prison with the attack of a fellow prisoner with hot grits, trying to smother another inmate with a mattress and biting off his ear, and using the "lock-in-a-sock" method to attack a security guard.
