Prisoner Allegedly Kills Cellmate for Being Black and Gay
Wisconsin inmate Jackson Vogel told investigators he killed 19-year-old Micah Laureano because he "checked all the boxes"
Jackson Vogel, an inmate at the Green Bay Correctional Institution, allegedly killed 19-year-old Micah Laureano because he was Black and gay.
Vogel, 24, is currently serving a 40-year sentence at the Wisconsin maximum security prison for repeatedly stabbing his mother with a knife, strangling her, and attempting to snap her neck when he was 16 years old.
Laureano was serving a three-year sentence after pleading no contest to charges of being a party to a crime of robbery and recklessly endangering safety, as well as bail jumping. In an email to The Associated Press, Maura McMahon, Laureano’s attorney, described her client as a funny, thoughtful young man who was a talented artist.
As reported by the Green Bay Press Gazette, Laureano had been placed in the same cell as Vogel, in the prison’s treatment center, for only a few hours before being murdered.
A correctional officer was doing a routine count of prisoners in the treatment center area around 9:30 p.m. on August 27 when he found a cell door with a pink piece of paper covering the window. The officer demanded the inmates remove the paper from the door.
Vogel complied with the officer’s request.
The officer then peered inside the cell, and saw Laureano unconscious. His body was hanging from the top bunk, with his arms and ankles bound together with orange material.
Laureano was pronounced dead at the scene.
Another correctional officer who took custody of Vogel reported that Vogel made “numerous unprovoked comments to him, including that he knocked out his cellmate, tied up his hands and feet, and then strangled him to death with his hands.”
Inside the 10-by-6-foot cell, officers located numerous cut strips of orange cloth, as well as a handwritten note with racist and homophobic slurs, as well as the words, “kill all humans.”
Vogel allegedly told investigators he killed Laureano because he was “bored.” He said he had wanted to kill the 19-year-old since the first time he met him, just days prior to the murder. He also said that Laureano “checked all the boxes,” including being Black and gay.
Vogel added he frequently thinks about killing people and claims that strangling someone — as he did Laureano — gave him a feeling of “ecstasy.”
Laureano is the sixth inmate to die in a Wisconsin maximum security prison since June 2023. His death marks the second death in the past two years at Green Bay Correctional Institution related to a hate crime investigation.
In October 2022, inmate Joshua Scolman, 40, stabbed 25-year-old Timothy Nabors and attempted to kill a second person during medication distribution.
In April 2024, Scolman was convicted of one count of first-degree intentional homicide and one count of attempted first-degree intentional homicide, with both charges carrying hate crime enhancements. He has been sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
It remains to be seen whether a similar charge will be handed down against Vogel, if he is convicted.
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