$7.5 Million Settlement in Suit Over California Jail Death
by Matt Clarke
On February 29, 2024, the federal court for the Central District of California approved a settlement under which Riverside County paid $7.5 million to the survivors of a county jail detainee who died in custody. The agreement resolved a lawsuit they filed blaming the death of Christopher Zumwalt, 39, on abuse by jailers and denial of mental health and medical care.
Zumwalt was arrested near his home on October 22, 2020, on suspicion of public intoxication—he admitted using methamphetamine—but was never charged with a crime. Instead, his arrest report stated he was to be released with a citation after sobering up. He was also given a citation for having a small amount of drugs on him when booked into the jail.
Video surveillance showed Zumwalt was calm while being booked and placed in a sobering cell. Over six hours later, nurse Christine Odhiambo checked in on him. In a deposition, she later claimed he became confrontational when asked to submit to a medical examination, which she reported to a doctor, who ordered Zumwalt’s stay in the sobering cell extended.
Three hours later, around midnight, 12 jail guards dressed in full riot gear arrived at the cell and ordered Zumwalt to lie on his stomach. But he continued pacing the cell, muttering incoherently. Over the course of the next eight minutes, they tossed two pepper spray-canisters into his cell, doused him with a two-second burst of pepper spray, and threw a Stinger 15 riot-control grenade into the cell, too, all while screaming orders at him to get on his stomach. The grenade exploded, launching 150 rubber pellets.
Zumwalt then briefly got on his stomach, but he got right back up, yelling, “No, please, please, I’ll die!” Guards then stormed the cell, led by a deputy carrying a stun shield. They shocked the detainee at least three times with Tasers; at least four guards knelt on his back while he gasped, “I can’t breathe.”
After they finally secured him to a restraint chair, a bloodied spit mask put in place, Zumwalt was wheeled to a “safety room.” Surveillance video showed his head lolling and his breathing was labored, yet guards left him alone for eight minutes. When a guard finally checked on him, the detainee was unresponsive. He was taken to a hospital and briefly resuscitated but died two days later when taken off life support.
Zumwalt’s family filed suit alleging the guards’ actions and failure to provide medical care caused his death. Defendants attempted to justify Zumwalt’s forcible extraction by saying he needed to undergo a medical examination. Yet, once extracted, he was not given any medical examination, despite jail policies requiring one before placement in a restraint chair. The policy also requires continuous monitoring of persons in restraint chairs.
The settlement agreement included $133,732.17 in costs and $2,946,507.13 fees for Plaintiff’s counsel, Pasadena attorney John Burton. Afterward, Sheriff Chad Bianco insisted that his deputies did nothing wrong; he called the settlement a business decision by the county’s insurance company. But the only business reason for a multimillion-dollar settlement is the expectation of a much higher jury award. See: Est. of Zumwalt v. Cty. of Riverside, USDC (C.D. Cal.), Case No. 5:21-cv-01791.
According to jail consultant and former Florida prison warden Ron McAndrew, the situation warranted mental health treatment, not extraction. “In 40 years, I have never seen a team of 12 officers, fully equipped with riot gear, line up for one man. I’d not only call this overkill, this is very punitive,” McAndrew said, adding that it’s “ludicrous to think barking orders is going to get you any results in a situation like that.” Former Idaho sheriff Gary Randy agreed that guards should have done more to deescalate the situation. Both he and McAndrew said use of an outdoor riot-control grenade was excessive and dangerous. But, of course, the guards did nothing wrong, according to Bianco, who insisted that it was a “methamphetamine-induced psychosis” which caused Zumwalt’s death.
Additional source: New York Times
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