Inmate Says It Was 'Like Hitting the Jackpot' When He Recognized His 70-Year-Old Cellmate, He's Now Serving 25 Years for What He Did Next
A Washington State inmate who killed the man convicted of raping his sister has been sentenced to nearly 25 years in prison for the crime.
Shane Goldsby, 26, was sentenced Tuesday after being convicted of killing Robert Munger, 70, last summer inside the Airway Heights Corrections Center where the two were cellmates, according to KHQ-TV.
Goldsby originally had been sentenced for a 2017 joyride in which he stole a police vehicle and then crashed it into another police vehicle, injuring a state trooper, the news outlet reported without identifying the length of that sentence.
After multiple brushes with corrections officers, Goldsby was transferred to Airway Heights, where he was put in a cell with Munger, who was serving a 43-year sentence for child sex crimes.
“I was in shock,” Goldsby told KHQ last year in an interview. “I was like, ‘What the f—‘… This stuff doesn’t happen. You’re talking the same institution, the same unit, the same pod in the same cell as this dude. That’s like hitting the jackpot in the casino seven times.”
Goldsby said he did not welcome sharing a cell with Munger.
“I was questioning things on what was going on, ‘Why is all this going on?’ But like I said, I gave my life to God in 2019. I quit gangbanging. I was doing good,” said Goldsby, who found out in their cell that Munger had been convicted of raping his sister.
“You put me in the same cell as this dude, I feel set up. I’m the victim,” Goldsby said.
Goldsby said Munger ignited his rage by bragging about his crimes.
“He kept … giving me details about what happened and what he did. About the photos and videos of him doing this stuff, and it was building up,” Goldsby said, according to KHQ.
“When I showed up in that unit, I walked out of that pod, went to an office and said, ‘Hey, I need a new cellie.’ And the correctional officer’s in that office was like, ‘What? No. We didn’t call you.’…
“Then I went back to my cell. We got something in there called a button. You hit it if something’s going on. So I hit that button too and nobody came on that mic at all. So, in my head, I’m not in my head at this point and time. I’m completely feeling like this is what they wanted to happen,” he said.
According to court documents obtained by KHQ, Goldsby “hit Munger in the face and head area about 14 times, (stomped) on his head at least four times and (kicked) a couple more times before walking away and being taken into custody by Airway Heights Corrections Guards.”
The state Department of Corrections policy regarding cellmates should have kept the two apart, but state officials said there was nothing in the file that connected the two men.
“They put me in a position that I shouldn’t even be in. This shouldn’t have happened, at all,” Goldsby said in his 2020 interview. “You’re talking about this dude, who did some sick twisted things to my little sis. My family. My blood. My life. And you want to put me face-to-face with this dude?”
At his sentencing Tuesday, Goldsby had his attorney read a statement to Munger’s family.
“I cannot imagine what it would be like to lose a loved one in this kind of way,” the statement read. “To his wife and his whole family I apologize. I am so sorry and I hope you are able to heal from what I caused.”
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