Maurice Monk, inset, died in custody in the beleaguered Santa Rita Jail in California, pictured, and his family has filed a wrongful death lawsuit. (Images from jail body camera video via Monk’s family lawyers)
An inmate died on his bunk in a California jail in a pool of his urine and feces as jailers and nurses ignored his medical distress and threw food and medications into his cell “like he was an animal in a pen at the zoo,” a lawsuit alleges.
Maurice Monk, 45, suffered a “slow, torturous death” at the hands of several Alameda County Sheriff’s deputies and medical staff while he was held for 34 days in 2021 at the beleaguered Santa Rita Jail, his family’s lawyers said. The jail is 40 miles east of San Francisco.
“The jail’s neglect stole Maurice from us,” Monk’s sister, Elvira Monk, said in a statement through the attorneys. “If not for their utter neglect, my brother would still be here today to go to his son’s upcoming high school graduation, hug his daughter and play with his nieces and nephews.”
It all started on Oct. 11, 2021. Monk, a part-time security guard, was arrested for not wearing a mask on a public bus and arguing with the driver. He was jailed after missing a court date because his lawyers said he couldn’t afford the $2,500 cash bail that would have kept him out of custody.
He languished in jail over the next 34 days. Jail staff were so callous and indifferent to his mental and physical health that he rapidly deteriorated in their care, attorney Adanté Pointer said.
“The people working at Santa Rita Jail denied Mr. Monk his basic humanity and demonstrated a callous disregard for human life,” Pointer said in a statement. “And Wellpath continues to provide subpar medical services while feasting on the public’s dime,” the statement added, referring to jail medical care contractor Wellpath Community Care LLC.
He died on Nov. 15, 2021. The county death certificate lists the cause of death as hypertensive cardiovascular disease.”
A second amended complaint of the federal civil rights lawsuit filed on behalf of Monk’s daughter and son on Friday in San Francisco names as defendants Alameda County, Wellpath, 15 Alameda County sheriff’s deputies, nine Wellpath nurses, and a physician’s assistant. It alleges they failed to provide adequate care.
Wellpath did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokeswoman for the Alameda County Sheriff’s Office declined to comment to Law&Crime due to the active litigation.
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Lawyers for the family say that during Monk’s time in custody, he went from talking and interacting with jail staff to being catatonic.
Lawyers said that jail and medical staff’s response to his final three days — as he lay motionless and not responding — was so callous that one inmate who helped distribute meals in the jail asked the deputies, “Are we just waiting for him to kick the bucket?”
The lawyers obtained 150 body camera videos showing Monk’s time in custody. The lawyers also said an internal affairs investigation into the death revealed jail and medical staff had forged the wellness check timelines and medication compliance logs required for the unit in which Monk was housed.
“A deputy even told investigators it was normal for deputies to miss several wellness checks and fill them in later to suggest deputies had conducted them,” the lawsuit said. “Wellpath medical staff and deputies observed, quipped and joked about Monk’s spiraling health over the final days of his life.”
When jailers finally lifted him off his cot, the logo from his jail-issued T-shirt had transferred onto the sheet, and he had bedsores from being in the same position for so long, court documents said.
“For three days, jail and medical staff claimed to see his toe move or his chest rise, so that was enough,” court documents said. “Until finally, a group of deputies and medical staff entered his cell after three days of not moving, eating or drinking, and discovered that Maurice Monk was stiff and not breathing.”
“They literally did nothing more than stare at him and throw food and medications into his cell like he was an animal in a pen at the zoo,” Pointer says. “Despite the obvious crisis, not a single guard or nurse thought enough about Mr. Monk to call for help.”
The federal government is monitoring the Santa Rita Jail, where 68 inmates have died since 2014 — including 11 since Monk died, the lawsuit said.
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