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Jesse Leroy Matthew, who is serving seven life sentences for two murders and a Fairfax County attack, has been transferred from Virginia’s highest-security prison to a lower-level facility.

Matthew, 44, was moved March 6 from Red Onion State Prison in Pound to Keen Mountain Correctional Center in Oakwood, according to the Virginia Department of Corrections’ online inmate locator.

Red Onion is Virginia’s most secure prison, classified as a Security Level 6 “supermax” facility. Keen Mountain is a Level 4 maximum-security prison.

Kyle Gibson, the department’s chief communications officer, confirmed the transfer and said Keen Mountain meets Matthew’s security needs while protecting corrections employees and the incarcerated population. He did not provide a specific reason for the move.

Gil Harrington, whose daughter Morgan was murdered by Matthew, said the department notified her digitally and by mail. However, she said she does not know how officials reached the decision.

Harrington and her husband, Dan, founded the nonprofit Help Save The Next Girl to promote personal safety following their daughter’s death.

“I don’t give Jesse Matthew much of my headspace,” Harrington said, but added that the transfer caused “some disquiet” because she feared it could signal plans to declare him rehabilitated.

Harrington said she does not believe Matthew can be rehabilitated and remains concerned that he is young enough to harm others. She also said someone serving seven life sentences should not be considered for a work-release program.

Matthew pleaded guilty in Albemarle County on March 2, 2016, to the murders of University of Virginia student Hannah Graham and Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington. He received four life sentences.

Graham was killed in 2014. Harrington was killed in 2009 after attending a concert in Charlottesville.

At the time of his guilty plea, Matthew was already serving three life sentences for the 2005 rape and attempted murder of a woman in Fairfax County. He was convicted and sentenced in that case in 2015.

Matthew was temporarily transferred from Red Onion to Sussex I State Prison in 2019 for cancer treatment. He later returned to Red Onion and had remained there for more than five years before the latest move.

Asked whether Matthew’s health prompted the transfer, Gibson did not specify. He said everyone in the department’s custody receives routine and urgent health care, including chronic-care visits and specialist appointments.

Matthew’s attorney, Douglas Ramseur, said he had not known about the transfer and did not know what led to it.

In a 2024 interview, Ramseur said Matthew had spent nearly all his time at Red Onion in isolated or segregated quarters, apart from a brief move for treatment of health problems.

After learning of the transfer, Ramseur said he was pleased Matthew was being allowed to move to a lower security level.