Trial Rescheduled for Ohio Prisoner Accused of Murdering Fellow Prisoner
Trial didn’t start as scheduled on July 26, 2024, for Southern Ohio Correctional Facility (SOCF) prisoner Austin Burke, 25, who is accused of murdering fellow prisoner Ruben Melendez, 65, in August 2023. That’s because Burke was handed a new indictment on July 3, 2024, accusing him of assaulting two SOCF guards with a shank the previous May.
Burke was described as part of the Cincinnati White Boyz, a smaller rival group to the Aryan Brotherhood (AB) prison gang. Melendez was reportedly a member of the Mexican Mafia, with which AB is sometimes allied. The fight between the two prisoners, which surveillance video showed the older man may have sparked, left him with a fatal head injury. Burke then landed in “Extreme Restricted Housing,” where he will remain for over 10 years, according to a letter he sent to PLN.
In his letter, Burke also questioned why SOCF guards left the two to interact. Neither had previously been charged with fighting. Burke is serving a life term for the August 2017 robbery and murder of Brandon Sample, who at 22 was four years older than Burke at the time.
Melendez was also serving a life sentence for a murder committed when he was 18, the brutal 1976 slaying of Tony Calistro, 24, in an Arizona park. For that, Melendez was originally sentenced to death, along with his cousin and co-defendant, Joe Cota Morales, who was 10 years older; however, the Arizona Supreme Court tossed both sentences. On retrial, Morales was acquitted, but Melendez was sentenced to life. He was reportedly considered part of a Security Threat Group when the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Corrections accepted his transfer to SOCF from the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Re-entry.
Burke’s trial for Melendez’s murder is now scheduled for October 21, 2024. He is represented by attorneys Edwin M. Bibler and Joel M. Spitzer of Spitzer Law Offices in Powell and Marion. See: State v. Burke, Ohio Comm. Pleas (Scioto Cty.), Case No. 23CR000636.
Additional sources: Portsmouth Daily Times, Warren Tribune Chronicle