Alaska Lawsuit Alleges Bad Medical Care In Prison Led To Inmate’s Death

The Civil Rights Complaint, filed on March 4, 2025 in the United States District Court for the District of Alaska, states, in part:

1. Lewis Jordan Jr. was a detainee at the Goose Creek Correctional Complex (“Goose Creek”) who died because of the deliberate indifference of the Defendants.
2. More specifically, Mr. Jordan died of bacterial meningitis, which developed when the Defendants callously failed to treat an ear infection for days on end—ignoring his pleas for help and the obvious signs that he was in grave danger.
3. On or about March 5, 2023, Mr. Jordan started feeling a stabbing pain in his ear and associated flu-like symptoms. These are obvious signs of an acute ear infection. He was otherwise of good health, had no history of malingering, and was generally known for his physically strong and vivacious presence.
4. Over the ensuing days, he became visibly weaker, sicker, and finally unable to even get out of bed or walk around his assigned housing unit as his raging ear infection turned into acute spinal meningitis.

5. Throughout this time period, Mr. Jordan repeatedly requested permission from Defendants Ouellette and Curney, among others, to visit the medical unit for an evaluation and treatment. Even as his pleas grew more desperate, he was never permitted the opportunity to see a medical provider to diagnose his illness.
6. To be clear, any qualified medical provider—indeed, likely any adult with some semblance of common sense—would have easily ascertained that Mr. Jordan had an acute ear infection, which is quickly, consistently, and cheaply remedied with basic oral antibiotics.
7. But he never got the chance. Mr. Jordan was completely denied any access to medical care no matter how desperate his pleas—or those of the other detainees who pled on his behalf given the obvious and severe nature of his distress.
8. In the early morning hours of March 10, 2023, Mr. Jordan was found unresponsive in his cell and was transported to Mat-Su Regional Hospital.
9. On April 27, 2023, Mr. Jordan died when his family made the heartwrenching decision to remove him from life support.
10. Had he seen a medical provider for an appropriate assessment and treatment at any point in the days leading up March 10, 2023, he would still be alive today.

57. At the time officers responded to his cell, Lewis was in-and-out of consciousness, and, at times, behaved a way that was highly dysregulated. This is known as “altered mental status” and is a known and prominent feature of someone experiencing acute meningitis. Coupled with high fever and an untreated ear infection, any medical professional would realize that altered mental state is diagnostic of a life-threatening infection, and immediately obtain blood cultures to determine the extent of the infection.

58. But because responding officers and medical staff Goose Creek simply assumed—without evidence—that Lewis was experiencing an overdose, and excluded all other potential causes as a result, Lewis did not receive any appropriate diagnostic procedures in the hours following the response to his cell, aside from the administration of Narcan.
59. As staff were administering Narcan, which can be life-saving if the patient has ingested opiates, other detainees and prisoners were imploring staff to take other measures and emphasized the fact that Lewis had not ingested any drugs—aside from ibuprofen.
60. Tests later confirmed that Lewis had not ingested any substances—aside from ibuprofen—and was, in fact, not experiencing an overdose. Instead, he was experiencing the predictable effects of an untreated infection.
61. Notwithstanding the fact that there was no evidence that Lewis ingested any substances aside from ibuprofen, Goose Creek staff told Mat-Su Regional Center that Lewis overdosed.

64. Due to severity of his condition and the delays in obtaining medical care, medical providers at Mat-Su Regional Medical Center placed Lewis in a medically induced coma, but he never recovered. Instead, Lewis fought for his life for weeks, experiencing immense pain, seizures, paralysis, and extreme distress, before his untimely death on April 27, 2023.
65. Through testing and observation, Mat-Su staff dispelled the false narrative provided by the Individual Defendants that Lewis was suffering the effects of an overdose, and had not taken any illegal drugs, but was rather suffering from an untreated severe bacterial meningitis infection.

92. To circumvent its reporting requirements, ADOC unilaterally paroled Lewis once it became clear that he would not regain consciousness.
93. Specifically, ADOC medically paroled Lewis under Alaska Stat. § 33.16.085, which provides that “upon application by the prisoner or the commissioner” a prisoner may “be released by the board on special medical parole if the board determines that because of the prisoner’s severe medical or cognitive disability, the prisoner will not pose a threat of harm to the public if released on parole.” Alaska Stat. § 33.16.085(a)(2)(B).

100. In this case, ADOC officials informed Lewis’ family of his hospitalization, explicitly stating that he was suffering the very serious effects of an overdose—which they knew to be untrue.
101. At the time this was communicated, ADOC officials were well aware that an untreated infection—which had morphed into severe bacterial meningitis—caused Lewis’ hospitalization. But Lewis was in a medically induced coma at that point and unable to immediately communicate as much to his family.
102. Only later did the family learn that Lewis did not, in fact, have any illegal drugs in his system and that his untimely death was the result of deliberate indifference by the Individual Defendants and the systemic failures of ADOC.

Source

If you or a loved one were injured due to deliberate indifference or the lack of appropriate medical care while incarcerated in a prison, jail, or other correctional facility in Alaska or in another U.S. state, you should promptly seek the legal advice of a local medical malpractice lawyer in your state who handles prisoner/inmate medical malpractice claims and may investigate your claim and represent you or your loved one, if appropriate.

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