Melville was among the committee of inmates who helped organize inmates' demands and keep order during the Attica Prison Riot in September 1971. Melville, 28 other inmates, and 10 hostages were shot and killed by state police on September 13, when the uprising was put down by order of Governor Nelson Rockefeller. According to some witnesses, Melville was alive after the initial assault was over and the prison was secure but was shot to death by law enforcement while trying to surrender. The law enforcement officer who shot Melville claimed he had done so because Melville was armed with explosives, but investigators and prosecutors could find no evidence to support this claim and lawyers for surviving prisoners maintained that he was "murdered in cold blood with his hands in the air in surrender".