Jesse Mathews - sentenced to life in prison without parole for killing a Chattanooga police sergeant and wounding another officer - was mistakenly placed in a lower security prison in October.
That marks the second time in as many years Mathews was placed in a lower security level prison by mistake.
Mathews, 30, was being held at West Tennessee State Penitentiary, a maximum security prison, and then was transferred to South Central Correctional Facility, a medium security prison, on Oct. 23, according to Tennessee Department of Correction Spokesman Robert Reburn.
Mathews was recently reclassified as a close custody prisoner, which the corrections department defines as a prisoner who requires heightened supervision because of his conduct and/or offense history. But the South Central Correctional Facility is not equipped to house close custody prisoners. He will be relocated to a close custody designated facility "ASAP," Reburn said.
There are four levels of prisoner classification in Tennessee - maximum custody, close custody, medium custody and minimum custody. Mathews was a maximum custody inmate but was recently reclassified as a close custody inmate.
Jesse Mathews, charged in the shooting death of Chattanooga Police Sgt. Tim Chapin, is escorted into city court in this file photo. Kevin Dawson, who police say traded weapons with Mathews, has been arrested and charged with federal weapons crimes.Representatives from South Central Correctional Facility did not return calls Thursday.
Mathews has had a strange incarceration history.
In 2003, when Mathews was 17, he was charged with 10 counts of armed robbery in Colorado Springs, Colo., and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. He was serving his sentence in a halfway house until he did not report back to the house the night of Feb. 12, 2011. He made his way to Chattanooga, where he attended a gun show in March and traded three guns for a M-4 assault rifle.
His family also moved to Chattanooga under the false last name "Moore" and hid Mathews.
On April 2, 2011, Mathews robbed the U.S. Money Shops pawnshop on Brainerd Road and got into a shootout with officers. Sgt. Tim Chapin was killed and Officer Lorin Johnston was wounded. Mathews eventually pleaded guilty to avoid the possibility of the death penalty.
Then, on Jan. 25, 2013, he was moved from a maximum security prison to a medium security prison. Less than a month later, he was moved back into a maximum security prison and Department of Correction officials were left scratching their heads as to why he was classified as a medium custody inmate in the first place given his violent record.
Thursday, officials were doing the same thing - wondering why after being reclassified as a close custody prisoner, he was placed in a less-secure medium security prison.
"Due to Mathews' recent reclassification, he should not have had another assessment so soon," Reburn said in an email. "Mathews is being returned to close custody at a state-run facility."
Contact staff writer Evan Hoopfer at ehoopfer@timesfreepress.com or @EvanHoopfer on Twitter or 423-757-6731.