CORALVILLE – Alex James Mabe, an inmate assigned to the Iowa Medical and Classification Center Mental Health Unit Q, was discovered unresponsive in the assigned room at 2:57 A.M. during a routine unit check.
The unit officer discovered Mabe hanging with bed sheet around the neck tied to a wall vent. An emergency was announced and health services staff and additional security staff responded immediately. The sheet was detached and emergency protocols, including CPR, were employed.
A Johnson County Emergency Response Team arrived at approximately 310 A.M. CPR continued and the ambulance departed for University Hospitals. Mabe was pronounced dead at 3:52 A.M.
An autopsy will be conducted by the Johnson County Medical Examiner, however there is no reason to believe the cause of death to be anything other than asphyxia due to suffocation.
Because this death was not related to natural causes, the incident remains under internal investigation.
Mabe was 38 years old and serving a 10 year sentence from Wapello County for Robbery Second Degree and Theft Third Degree. This sentence began on January 18, 2013.