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Class Action Lawsuit Filed Against King County Jail

By David Packman

I've been wondering when this would happen. It's good to see that the King County Jail (located in downtown Seattle) will finally be taken to task over it's failure to treat detainees in need of medical care and preventing the spread of MRSA infections in that hellhole. Glad to see someone took up the call to represent all these people since the ACLU of Washington State sure wasn't interested in defending their rights!

The legal discussions between the jail and the US DOJ over their charges that the King County Jail violated the rights of detainees there are still ongoing, by the way.

From the report in the Seattle PI:

Filed in U.S. District Court in Seattle, the lawsuit contends jail officials failed to stop the spread of a highly infectious strain of staph infection called MRSA. During a five-month period beginning in September, at least 65 inmates were diagnosed with MRSA; one inmate afflicted with MRSA and a flesh-eating bacteria died while in custody.

The plaintiff, 40-year-old Matthew Wisecarver, suffered serious injuries when surgeons were forced to dig into his hand to remove an MRSA infection he contracted in jail, said his attorney, Ed Budge of Seattle. Wisecarver didn't receive treatment for the infection until he was released from jail, where he was being held pending trial on domestic violence charges.

The county's inability to stop the spread of the disease amounted to a violation of inmates' rights to equal protection under the law and freedom from cruel or unusual punishment, Budge said.

"As soon as they close that door behind you, you're pretty much at the mercy of those jailers," Budge said. "If they don't do what the Constitution mandates, which is get you immediate medical attention, there's not a darn thing you can do about it."

Last year, the U.S. Justice Department's Civil Rights Division released a report highly critical of the county Department of Adult and Juvenile Detention, which operates the Seattle jail. Justice investigators found that the jail didn't have proper procedures in place to deal with a host of problems, from handling suicidal inmates to investigating complaints against corrections officers.

Trust me, I know they didn't care if you were innocent or guilty, if you were just accused or had been convicted. Once they put you in that dungeon you lost all your rights and you were treated like an animal... hell, worse than that as most people would take their pet to the vet if they suffered like most people do in that inhuman place.

I wish them the best of luck and I hope all those victims find justice at long last!

Full post as published by Injustice in Seattle on May 21, 2008 (boomark / email).