In August 2023, a Florida jury awarded the surviving spouse and children of a jail inmate a total of $16 million, which included $6 million in compensatory damages and $10 million in punitive damages, for the death of a jail inmate caused by the delay in providing medical treatment that led to the inmate’s death.
Armor Correctional Health Services held the contract to provide Santa Rosa County jail inmates with health care services between 2012 and 2018. In 2016, the inmate, a 44-year-old married woman with three children, was diagnosed with pneumonia but there was an unnecessary delay in transferring her to a hospital for treatment, which resulted in the woman becoming septic, which resulted in her death in the emergency room.
The family’s medical malpractice and wrongful death lawsuit alleged that Armor Correctional Health Services was negligent in failing to provide proper care while the woman was in the jail, and was further negligent in failing to timely send the woman to the hospital.
After the jury returned its verdict in favor of the plaintiffs, their attorney stated, “I’m so happy this courageous family finally gets some closure for the tragic loss of their wife and mother.”
The Tributary, a northeast Florida journalism collective, reported that it found at least a dozen people who said they did not get their prescriptions while jailed between December and June 2023, and that “deaths in the Duval County jail have tripled since Armor Correctional Health Services started handling health care – with about four deaths per year from 2012 to 2017 and about 13 deaths per year since 2018.”
Jacksonville hired Armor Correctional Health Services in October 2017 to provide health care services to inmates in its jail: “The last year the city used its own medical care, there were two deaths in the jail. The first year under Armor, there were 9. That increased rate has continued.”
The Tributary found “contracts between the company and at least eight Florida counties have been dropped over the last few years for various reasons including a lack of accountability or inadequate care provided by the company’s employees.”
The Tributary analyzed 46 autopsies of the 109 deaths in the jail since 2010 and found that at least 44 deaths since 2018 can be attributed to medical issues, including deaths from any type of pre-existing condition (14), COVID (9), pneumonia (3), seizures (2), suicides (8) and overdoses or withdrawals (8).
A Reuters investigation found that where Armor provided health care services in jails, Armor had the second highest death rate in the three-year period from 2016 to 2018, at 18.8 deaths per 10,000 inmates. In 2018, nine people died at the Duval County jail, where Armor was in the first year of its contract with the jail.
If you or a loved one were injured due to the lack of appropriate medical care in jail in the United States, you should promptly seek the legal advice of a local medical malpractice lawyer in your state who handles jail medical malpractice claims and may investigate your claim and represent you or your loved one, if appropriate.
Visit our website or call us toll-free in the United States at 800-295-3959 to be connected with jail medical malpractice lawyers in your state who may assist you.
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