At Least $78,000 in Sealed Settlement for Texas Jail Prisoner’s Suicide

by Matt Clarke

On March 11, 2013, a Texas federal court approved the settlement of a lawsuit over the suicide death of a Texas prisoner who hung himself using the phone cord in his isolation cell at the Harrison County Jail.

Julius Eugene Maloy was arrested for a probation violation on March 15, 2009 and booked into the Harrison County Jail. According to court documents, at booking Maloy revealed that he had attempted suicide within the past year, suffered from depression, was taking antidepressant medication and had received suicide counseling. However, he was not given an evaluation by a trained mental health professional.

Maloy was placed in a general population cell block and on March 21, 2009 other prisoners in the cell block reported to jail officials that Maloy was threatening to kill himself. No action was taken.

On March 24, 2004, Maloy saw the jail's lone medical professional, a licensed vocational nurse (LVN). The LVN observed that Maloy was shaking and hearing voices. She knew that he had only been using amitriptyline for three weeks – itself a red flag for increased suicide risk – yet, instead of having him evaluated by mental health professionals, reduced his antidepressant dosage by half, a medication adjustment she did not have the authority to perform.

The reduction in dosage was even greater because Maloy only received his medications – including the antidepressant and hypertension medication—about half of the time he was supposed to. The LVN also had him transferred to an isolation cell with a corded phone which he used to hang himself that evening.

Represented by Austin attorney Jeff Edwards and Marshall attorney Michael Bernoudy, Maloy's wife, children and parents filed a federal civil right suit pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §1983 alleging that Harrison County, Sheriff William T. McCool, jail personnel and phone service providers Global Tel*Link and AGM Telecom violated Maloy’s constitutional rights and state tort laws when they ignored his serious medical needs and placed him in an isolation cell equipped with a corded phone.

The lawsuit cited several studies, including a report of the Texas Commission on Jail Standards, and lawsuits predating Maloy's death, showing that corded phones were dangerous in that suicidal prisoners frequently used them to hang themselves. It also noted six Harrison County Jail prisoner deaths prior to or immediately after Maloy's which were allegedly due to suicide or medical neglect and alleged that these deaths had not resulted in policy changes or disciplinary action against jail personnel who were negligent or indifferent to the prisoners' medical needs. According to court documents, jail personnel were given no training on identifying and protecting suicidal prisoners, had a known practice of failing to perform mandatory welfare checks on prisoners in isolation cells, and ignored the policy of having suicidal prisoners evaluated by the county's mental health authorities.

Because minors were involved, the court ordered the settlement sealed. However, it did later order the deposit of a total of $78,133.68 into the court’s registry for the use of the minor children when they turn 18. Additionally, some amount was paid to Maloy's wife to help with the upkeep of the children, including clothing, school supplies, driver's education and college entrance exam fees. See: Bogamy v. Harrison County, U.S.D.C. (E.D. Tex.), Case no. 2:11-cv-00088-JRG.

Additional source: news-journal.com

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