ROCKFORD - A federal prison inmate has been sentenced to a term of life imprisonment in connection with the murder of his cellmate.

HOUSTON CLYDE, 28, formerly of the Navajo Nation in Arizona, stabbed his cellmate to death while the pair were incarcerated in November 2020 at the United States Penitentiary in Thomson, Ill. The fatal stabbing occurred while Clyde was serving a 17-year sentence for a 2016 murder in Tuba City, Ariz.

Clyde pleaded guilty earlier this year to a second-degree murder charge. U.S. District Judge Iain D. Johnston imposed the life sentence during a hearing on Wednesday in federal court in Rockford.

The sentence was announced by Andrew S. Boutros, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, and Douglas S. DePodesta, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago Field Office of the FBI.

"Nothing is more abrupt or final than the taking of another's life by a violent act," Assistant U.S. Attorney Jessica Maveus argued in the government's sentencing memorandum. "This murder extends beyond the taking of a life-it shattered the lives of those expecting the victim to return home from prison."