DeKalb County Sheriff’s Office reports deaths of two inmates

DECATUR, GA –– The DeKalb County Sheriff’s Office said that two inmates have died this week in unrelated incidents while in custody of the DeKalb County Jail.

College Park resident Michael Assevero, 65, was found hanging in his jail cell and unresponsive on Sunday, Aug. 14, and was pronounced deceased following unsuccessful emergency medical treatment by on-site inmate health services and DeKalb EMS. Preliminary reports indicate suicide as the apparent cause of death.

Assevero had been in custody of DeKalb County Sheriff’s Office since Aug. 11, 2022 after being arrested on a warrant for Failure to Appear in court on violation of the Georgia Rico Act. The arrest took place while Assevero was hospitalized and in custody of another agency.

In another incident, Snellville resident Viktor Ivanov Radunchev, 27, was found hanging in his jail cell and unresponsive onTuesday, Aug. 16, and was pronounced deceased following unsuccessful emergency medical treatment by on-site inmate health services and DeKalb EMS. Preliminary reports indicate suicide as the apparent cause of death.

Radunchev had been in custody of the sheriff’s office since Aug.13 following his arrest by another agency on charges of Simple Assault and Battery-Family Violence, which allegedly occurred on the same day at a business on Presidential Parkway in Atlanta, Georgia.

Both incidents remain under investigation by the sheriff’s Office of Professional Standards.