Widow demands answers after husband is strangled to death in EKCC

Ashley Elgin is fighting for justice after her husband, 34-year-old Robert Broyles Jr., was strangled to death at the Eastern Kentucky Correctional Complex in August 2025, just nine days before his scheduled release.

Broyles, who Elgin describes as “the best husband” and “the best dad I’ve ever met in my life,” was serving time for a non-violent weapons charge. The couple had been married for five years and were raising three children together.

“Before me and him got together, he had breaking and entering charges,” Elgin said.

After his release from those earlier charges, Broyles was pulled over for car trouble in Elgin’s vehicle with her gun inside. With his felony record, he was arrested and charged with possession of a handgun by a convicted felon and sent to the Eastern Kentucky Correctional Complex in September 2024.

Nearly a year after he arrived at EKCC, Broyles was found dead in his cell on Aug. 31, 2025.

According to an autopsy report, Broyles had possible ligature marks on his wrists, hands, and neck, along with other injuries to his head and body. His death was classified as a homicide. The report reads, “inmate was in cell with another inmate and was strangled with something.”

Daleon Rice, 45, who was serving a 40-year sentence for attempted murder of a police officer and assault (domestic violence) in 2016, was charged with Broyles’ murder.

Since the murder, Elgin says the Eastern Kentucky Correctional Complex has provided no answers despite her repeated attempts to contact them.

“EKCC hasn’t even called me back. Like, I have called, no lie, at least 60 times,” Elgin said.

When she first called the facility after learning of the murder, Elgin says the response was shocking.

“When I first called up there, when they asked why I was calling, I said my husband was just murdered up there. She goes ‘Who?’ How many people do you have murdered up here, you know, if you have to ask who,” Elgin questioned.