Exterior of the Dallas County Jail (Dallas County Jail)
The family of a 60-year-old woman who developed pneumonia in an Alabama jail and died from septic shock days after she was released has filed a lawsuit alleging jailers ignored her worsening medical condition until it was too late.
Mary Strong died this month after she was released from the Dallas County Jail in Selma in April 2022. She had been in custody for drug-related offenses since June 2021, according to the lawsuit filed in federal court by plaintiff Denise Strong, Mary Strong’s daughter and a representative of the estate. The lawsuit names the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office, jail staff, and the county commission as defendants.
“This was preventable,” said Martin Weinberg, the family’s lawyer, in an email to Law&Crime. “We have a lot of questions surrounding Mary’s medical care while she was in the Dallas County jail and the extent and quality of that care.”
In an email to Law&Crime, Randy McNeill, an attorney for the defendants, said, “There is a significant difference between allegations and actual facts. We are preparing a motion to dismiss the case.”
The lawsuit lays out the allegations. It said the defendants ignored her medical needs when Strong had symptoms of pneumonia in March and April 2022. On April 1 of that year, Strong was released from jail on a self-recognizance bond for medical reasons, court documents said.
The Strong family did not learn about her poor health from the sheriff’s department, the lawsuit alleges. An inmate told the family she was being released because she was not eating, was not using the bathroom, could not walk, and had difficulty breathing, the documents said.
Her condition worsened after she was released, court documents said, and she had to be hospitalized as she had been suffering from sepsis. She died of septic shock on April 5, 2022.
The lawsuit said Sheriff Michael L. Granthum went before the Dallas County Commission in 2019 to request more funding for the medical budget at the Dallas County Jail, saying the department only had $140,00 allowed for medical.
“Why that number was in there, I have no idea, because we’ve had medical bills before where one inmate required $250,000-$300,000,” Granthum told the panel, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit said jail staff should have known that Strong — at 60 — was susceptible to pneumonia and sepsis because of her age and that failure to properly treat her conditions would probably lead to her death.
“Purposely failing to adequately or timely provide medical treatment and transfer to a hospital is prima facie deliberate indifference and conscious disregard for the life and well-being of Mary,” the lawsuit said. “Further, upon information, the defendants had a policy and a financial reason to deliberately and consciously deny medical care to Mary, and thus, employed a common scheme used by these defendants wherein they merely released the prisoner to circumvent their statutory duty.”
The lawsuit said the defendants acted “negligently, willfully, wantonly and with deliberate indifference.” It said they provided below-standard medical care.
Weinberg said the case highlights the need for a broader discussion on how local entities handle inmate medical care.
“As of right now they can shirk from their financial responsibility of care,” he said.
The lawsuit alleges jailers failed to do a proper medical intake when Strong was admitted to the jail.
“If Strong had received proper medical care and attention at the Dallas County Jail, including, but not limited to proper, timely, and complete antibiotic therapy, then Mary would have likely survived,” the lawsuit says.
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