Former Camden County Jail Corporal Sentenced to 16 Months for Assaulting Detainee

Ryan Robert Biegel, 27, a former Jail Corporal with the Camden County Sheriff’s Office, has been sentenced to 16 months in federal prison and three years of supervised release for using unreasonable force against a pretrial detainee.

Biegel pleaded guilty on January 28, 2025, before U.S. District Judge Lisa G. Wood to one count of violating the civil rights of a detainee identified as J.H.

According to court documents, the assault occurred on September 3, 2022, when Biegel and two other correctional officers entered a holding cell where J.H. was detained. While the other officers restrained J.H. against a wall, Biegel punched him five times in the back of the head and then continued to strike him in the head and body 22 more times with his fists and knees. Biegel admitted the force was neither reasonable nor necessary.

The FBI Brunswick RA Field Office and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation conducted the investigation. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Jennifer J. Kirkland of the Southern District of Georgia and Trial Attorney Alec Ward of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.