White supremacist founder of the 211 Crew Prison Gang, Benjamin Davis, died while incarcerated, according to a statement released by the Colorado Department of Corrections (DOC) Sunday. Mark Fairbairn, the DOC’s public information officer, said: “We are not confirming any location.” The Denver Post noted. Fairbairn said the death of 42-year-old Davis could lead to disruption and fights in DOC facilities. The inspector general for the DOC and prison officials are investigating Davis’ death as a potential suicide.
Following a 1994 robbery spree, Davis was sentenced to prison.
In 1995, he received a 30-year-sentence for first-degree assault and robbery. In November 1994, Davis shot a man while he was robbing a Denver-area restaurant. After his father alerted law enforcement authorities, he was arrested at a bus station in Las Vegas.
Prison violence led to founding of 211 prison gang
While he was incarcerated, a black inmate beat him severely and Davis’ jaw was broken. Israel Davis, his father, wrote a judge in 2007 and stated that his son had to hold his jaw up with his hands because it was “badly broken,” the New York Daily News relayed.
Davis and a different inmate reacted to the reported violence against Davis by launching the white supremacist 211 prison gang in 1995.
The moniker represents California penal code for robbery. The gang’s alternate name is Brotherhood of Aryan Alliance, denoted by the 211 numeric code.
In 2007, Davis received an additional 108-year sentence – 12 years for soliciting and conspiring to commit prison assaults and 96 years for violating Colorado’s Organized Crime Control Act.
Along with Davis, 18 more people were indicted. The 211 crew communicated with secretive slang and with coded notes, according to the Daily Record.
The 211 gang suspected of ordering hit on state corrections director
Davis, leader of the 211 gang, had suspected involvement in the 2013 shooting death of DOC director Tom Clements.
Texas Rangers discerned that Clements was murdered at his home in Monument, CO by 211 gang member Evan Ebel. The 28-year-old white supremacist was killed in a shootout with Texas law enforcement four days later. A high-speed chase led to the shootout, during which Ebel wounded a Texas deputy.
Ebel was a parolee and is believed to have killed 27-year-old Domino’s Pizza deliveryman Nathan Leon for his shirt. Ebel took the shirt and used it as a disguise when he went to kill Clements. Since investigators have not yet determined whether Ebel acted alone or as a result of others ordering him to kill Clements, the murder case remains unsolved.
The outcome of an investigation by Texas Rangers concluded that leaders of the 211 gang put a hit on Clements.
The Rangers, as well as the FBI, discovered that there were hundreds of phone calls between 211 gang leaders and Ebel in the days leading up to and following the murders of Ebel and Leon, according to the Denver Post. Texas Ranger James Holland noted in his May 28, 2013 investigation report that the murder of Clements was “ordered by hierarchy of the 211 prison crew.”
Judge concluded white supremacist failed at rehabilitation
When Davis was sentenced in 2007, District Judge William Robbins told him that he "failed miserably at prison rehabilitation,” according to the Denver Post. Judge Robbins also stated to Davis, “You don’t need to be on the streets in 40 or 50 years.”
In an effort to prevent a prison uprising, Fairborn said that the DOC declined to specify if Davis died in a cell or another place within the facility. The DOC is not stating where Davis was housed within the state’s penal system. The only information that is known at this time is that the white supremacist is dead.
