22nd San Quentin inmate dies of coronavirus

San Quentin State Prison.

The 22nd inmate at San Quentin State Prison has died of coronavirus -- the second such death in as many days, the California Department of Corrections said on Tuesday.

The person died on Monday.  

On Sunday, Death Row inmate Orlando G. Romero, 48, was pronounced dead of the virus, too. Romero was sentenced to death in Riverside County on Aug. 28, 1996, for first-degree murder and second-degree robbery while armed with a firearm. 

To date, nearly 50 inmates in California have died of the coronavirus. Nearly half are from San Quentin and the majority of the rest of the deaths stemmed from the California Institution for Men in Chino. 

Activists have been working to release more incarcerated people from jails and prisons, which have been described as tinderboxes of the deadly virus.