A 21-year-old McFarland man, who struggled with mental illness and was accused of making telephone threats that locked down the UW-Madison campus in 2007, killed himself Monday night, three days after his arrival in a state prison where he was in solitary confinement.

The Department of Corrections is reviewing the circumstances surrounding the death of Jesse A. Miller at the Columbia Correctional Institution in Portage, where he was found by staff during rounds at 11:58 p.m. Monday "lying face up on the floor, motionless and nonresponsive" with torn fabric from a sheet or pillowcase wrapped around his neck, spokesman John Dipko said.

Miller’s mother, Fawne Sandy Grandy, said he had just been transferred from the Wisconsin Resource Center, a mental-health treatment facility for inmates. Sandy Grandy said she notified the center about a month ago that she had received a letter from her son saying he was suicidal.

According to court records, Miller suffered from bipolar disorder and reactive attachment disorder, which stems from not forming normal attachments to primary caregivers at a young age.

Dipko said Miller had been assessed upon his arrival at Columbia and had been assigned to a special unit based on his "vulnerable status."

Miller was in the opening days of a 184-day term in solitary confinement, Dipko said, for disruptive conduct and misuse of government property at another institution.

Inmates in segregation at Columbia are checked hourly but are not continually monitored by camera, Dipko said. The last round of checks before Miller was found was at 11:05 p.m., he said.

Madison attorney Eric Schulenburg called Miller’s death "a tragedy," saying Miller "was always at risk."

"He was really, in my opinion, a wonderful young man who had mental illness he couldn’t beat," said Schulenburg, who represented Miller on his most recent charges in Dane County Circuit Court.

Miller was serving three consecutive prison sentences for attempted armed robbery, resisting or obstructing police and expelling bodily substances and was scheduled to be released July 8. 2011, Dipko said.

He was initially sentenced to serve one year in the Dane County Jail as a condition of probation for the 2006 attempted armed robbery conviction. While serving that sentence, he failed to return to the jail after a medical appointment, and on Sept. 25, 2007, police say he called the Dane County Crisis Intervention Center and claimed to be on top of the UW Hospital parking ramp with a weapon and that he "wanted to be killed by a police officer."

Police said they did not have the evidence needed to charge Miller with making the call, but Miller, who was in San Diego at the time, was convicted of resisting or obstructing police for making a misleading phone call to police on Sept. 27, 2007.

Court records provide a glimpse into the tragic circumstances of Miller’s life, beginning with his exposure to cocaine in utero resulting in premature birth, followed by three months in a neonatal intensive-care unit.

He also suffered physical, sexual and emotional abuse before age 4, when he was removed from his parents’ home, and had 54 placements by the time he was 18.

Sandy Grandy said she, Miller and his siblings had been abused by her husband, Miller’s father, and that she had gone to a shelter with the children to get them away from the abuse.

"We realize Jesse’s life was tragic," Sandy Grandy said, adding, "we begged and pleaded" to have Miller be placed in a treatment facility because "he didn’t have the mental capacity to be in the prison."

Neither Dipko nor Stephanie Marquis, spokeswoman for the state Department of Health Services, would confirm that Miller had been a patient at the Wisconsin Resource Center, citing state law protecting confidentiality.

Dipko said Miller entered the state prison system on June 4, 2008, at the Dodge Correctional Institution, where he remained for just over two weeks before being transferred to another institution, which he would not identify.

Miller was transferred from that institution to Columbia on Friday, where he was kept in a segregated cell for 23 hours a day because of rule violations he had committed at the other institution, Dipko said.

Dipko said the other institution considered it appropriate for Miller to be placed in the Columbia prison and was aware that he would be in segregation. Miller’s 184 days in segregation could have been suspended as early as mid-July for good behavior, Dipko said.

Services for Miller will take place Monday at Gunderson Funeral Home, 5203 Monona Drive, with visitation at noon and a funeral at 1 p.m.