WHITEVILLE — A former Columbus County detention officer is heading to prison after he set up an inmate for a jailhouse beating.

The U.S. Justice Department says federal Judge Malcolm Howard sentenced former Sgt. Danny Ray Duncan to 20 months in prison.

The 63-year-old Duncan admitted last fall that while working on the night shift at the Columbus County jail in Whiteville in 2010 he placed a pretrial detainee in a cell knowing he would likely be attacked by two other inmates.

Inmate Terry McMillian will spend 46 more months behind bars for his role in the attack. Prosecutors say McMillian and another inmate brutally beat the detainee identified in court documents only as J.W.