Correctional Officer Edward Ashley Pounds

Edward Ashley Pounds

Correctional Officer Edward Pounds succumbed to injuries sustained two months earlier when he was assaulted by an inmate at the Neuse Correctional Institution. He was struck several times in the neck by the inmate and sustained serious injuries on November 17, 2009.

On January 6, 2010, he returned to work but became violently ill. He was transported to a hospital and died three days later.

An investigation by the state medical examiner's office determined that Officer Pound's death was the result of the assault and ruled a homicide. The 24 year-old inmate was arrested at his home in Tarboro, five days after his release from prison for auto theft. He was formally charged with murder on February 17, 2011, and is being held in the Wayne County Jail without bond.

On December 4, 2013, the suspect was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 5 years and 11 months in prison. With his credit for time served in the Wayne County Jail he is to be released April 15, 2016. In June of 2014 he was convicted of assault inflicting serious injury stemming from a 2009 unrelated incident in Edgecombe County. He was sentenced to 23 months which changed his release date to March 1, 2018.

Since December 18, 2013, the suspect's prison record reported that he has assaulted prison staff and guards 24 times, damaged state or another's property 23 times, has set 14 fires, tampered with 18 locks, been caught with a weapon seven times, attempted five felonious acts, escaped twice, taken hostages, and has disobeyed orders numerous times. Because of this there have been more charges and convictions and his release date is gradually being changed; now set for July 15, 2018. He was paroled July 15, 2018.

On February 24, 2022, he shot and killed a man, age 30, at the Executive Inn, in the 1800 block of North Wesleyan Boulevard, in Rocky Mount. He was arrested in Greenville four days later and charged with first degree murder. His trial is set to start in Nash County on June 27, 2023.

Officer Pounds was a U.S. Air Force veteran and had served with the North Carolina Division of Prisons for three years. He is survived by his wife, daughter, son, and sister.