Kentucky State Police

Trooper Shane Jacobs said 25-year-old Eric Barnett of Pineville, about 200 miles southeast of Louisville, had a court appearance Wednesday and was taken into custody. Jacobs said a bailiff, whose name wasn't available, was escorting Barnett to the basement for transfer when the bailiff was knocked to the ground in an altercation inside an elevator and his weapon taken by Barnett.

Jacobs said Barnett, who wasn't handcuffed, shot himself while still in the elevator and was pronounced dead at the scene.

Kentucky State Police investigated the attack on Nicholson, a Vermont inmate, at a prison run by the for-profit Corrections Corporation of America.

But after he died in his sleep a few weeks later, no one told police.

Investigators learned of his death when The Associated Press asked about it weeks after that.