An Alabama inmate with “severe mental and psychological needs” was reportedly placed in a concrete tank known as a “freezer” before dying from hypothermia.The death was ruled a homicide, according to reports. USA Today.
Anthony Don Mitchell died in the custody of the Walker County Sheriff’s Department on January 26, 2023, after spending two weeks in the Walker County Jail “under appalling conditions.” The facility is located in Jasper, approximately 40 miles north of Birmingham.
Mitchell’s mother, Margaret Mitchell, claims in a 53-page lawsuit that prison officials intentionally exposed her 33-year-old son to freezing temperatures for more than 24 consecutive hours. She also claimed that officers withheld medication, treatment, water and even toilet access from her son.
NBC News report Mitchell’s death certificate indicated that he died of hypothermia and “sepsis resulting from infectious injuries and medical negligence sustained while incarcerated.”Walker County Coroner Joey Vick announced on Monday Mitchell’s death has been ruled a homicide.
John Goldfarb, an attorney representing Mitchell’s family in the lawsuit, said: “Tony’s death was a wrongful death, the result of horribly malicious abuse and a great deal of willful indifference.” Stated.
The defendants include Walker County Sheriff Nick Smith, jail administrator Justin White, nurses, investigators and more than a dozen correctional officers, according to the complaint.
Randy McNeil, who is representing the sheriff and correctional officers in the case, said he could not comment on the case “because the investigation is ongoing,” according to USA Today.
The lawsuit also states that when Mitchell arrived for treatment, doctors wrote in emergency room records that he was “unresponsive, had no pulse, and was cold to the touch.”
“We do not know under what conditions the patient was incarcerated, but it is difficult to understand a rectal temperature of 72 degrees Celsius and 22 degrees Celsius while in prison. His hypothermia. “The cause of his death is not clear. He may have had an underlying medical condition that caused hypothermia. We do not know if he could have been exposed to a cold environment,” doctors wrote in the lawsuit. There is.
Associated Press report Conditions are already dire at state prisons, where a mentally ill man is facing a lawsuit alleging he was “burned to death” in overheated cells.
Thomas Lee Rutledge reportedly died of hyperthermia on December 7, 2020, while staying at the William E. Donaldson Correctional Facility in Bessemer. When Rutledge was finally found unresponsive in a mental health room, his internal temperature had reached 109 degrees.
Defendants in the case include prison staff, wardens and contractors.
No criminal charges have been filed against the defendants in Mitchell’s death, Goldfarb said.
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