Prison Guards Found Not Guilty of any Wrongdoing by Boiling Inmate to Death

[T3X4S]

https://www.yahoo.com/news/prison-guards-who-boiled-schizophrenic-inmate-to-death-will-not-face-charges-130204831.html

[FloatingFatMan]

Despicable. Utterly utterly despicable.

[Memphis]

Charges should have been brought period. That said, I am sick of the hyperbole in the title of this article. Not only was he not boiled alive or suffered a single burn according to the autopsy, no evidence has ever been presented (been following this for a bit now) that shows the water was hotter than legal requirements. On to some publicly available evidence

 

Florida follows the SBCCI plumbing code regulating water temperature to no more than 120f and its practically a guarantee that the prison was following this building code, but not even this matters as 5 minutes of exposure to 120f water can cause 3rd degree burns. Given that he spent two hours in the shower, it is impossible for the water to have been greater than 111f or he would have guaranteed burns. If anyone is curious I will dig up some sources for these numbers from when I discussed this on my Facebook. Simply put, he died because the guards were careless and did not possess efficient mental health training involving the physiological responses in patients with mental health. So many articles about this make this sound way worse and if you will almost an intentional murder. It is important to note that the autopsy shows a person without heart disease and mental health issues would have not died or even needed hospital after this event. Mental health training is severely lacking and I can tell you that first hand when I watch police talking to patient in the Emergency room I work with. Some are nice and respectful, and some manage to get argumentative, frustrated, etc with someone who is clearly a mental health patient that this approach is useless on. Bottom line, police and correctional officers need more training on mental health issues

Edited March 21, 2017 by sidroc

[Rippleman]

What the article doesn't mention is the size of the showers. In the past, I have done pay-or-stay fine options for large traffic tickets and the showers are huge 8 X 8's in the centers I have seen if they are not huge 20 X 20's.  Due to the reporting: "After starting to wash, Rainey said, “No, I don’t want to do this,” and leaned on a wall away from the water" I speculate it was a huge shower with open exit to a sit down/change spot.  If an adult inmate chooses for himself to stay under a user-controlled shower at a temperature of his choosing, sounds like 100% intentional harm/suicide.  Sure guards should prevent it, but there is no system that is 100% fool proof. Had they been there to watch him 24 hours a day (especially during a shower) someone else would say "where is his privacy" and demand they not watch him! Damned if you do, damned if you don't. I too would toss this case out.

[techbeck]

Guards way over did things here and some kind if punishment should be given.  Very least,they all should be fired.

 

That said, no the inmate was not boiled to death.    Experts testified to this.  This would have to be some major coverup if it is true.  Its not like they took the word of the guards/witnesses only.

[FloatingFatMan]

^Agreed.  Was the inmate "boiled to death"? Of course not, that's virtually impossible.  Is it despicable that the guards get away with their alleged actions with zero sanction at all? Absolutely yes!  This man was, according to reports, mentally ill.  Forcing him into the shower like this would only worsen his poor mental state.

 

Why was he even IN a regular jail? Clearly, they could not meet his care needs.

[Memphis]

^Agreed.  Was the inmate "boiled to death"? Of course not, that's virtually impossible.  Is it despicable that the guards get away with their alleged actions with zero sanction at all? Absolutely yes!  This man was, according to reports, mentally ill.  Forcing him into the shower like this would only worsen his poor mental state.
 
Why was he even IN a regular jail? Clearly, they could not meet his care needs.

Part of the problem is that treating mental health treatment has never been good. In the past, he might have been insrituionalized and while on the surface this sounds better than the outpatient mental health we have today, in practice this also lead to abuse. Institutions need to make a comeback however and have bettet oversight.

[DocM]

On 3/22/2017 at 9:55 AM, sidroc said:

Part of the problem is that treating mental health treatment has never been good. In the past, he might have been insrituionalized and while on the surface this sounds better than the outpatient mental health we have today, in practice this also lead to abuse. Institutions need to make a comeback however and have better oversight.

 

This cannot be overstated.  A large part of the homeless, and especially the imprisoned, population are seriously mentally ill and largely untreated/unmedicated because they simply refuse to be - and then trouble ensues.  As predictable as sunrise.

 

Unfortunately, the civil libertarian and public hospital/mental health budget cutting pendulums swung too far in the 1970's to 1980's and here we are.  Not a partisan issue, a bipartisan failure. Those monies were coveted by other interests and we're still paying for it.

 

And let's also not forget that a large percentage of the spree killers we see today are seriously mentally ill people who are in outpatient care and need much stronger supervision or long term institutionalization. Almost too many to count.

 

Better oversight is indeed needed for broader scale institutionalization, but that's no excuse for not getting this huge policy mistake corrected.

 

Not only that, but a revitalized public community hospital system, preferably administered at the county or regional level, would go a long ways to meeting the needs not being met, or being met at enormous cost,  by poorly structured federal health programs like Obamacare. We had them once and stupidly abandoned them.

 

In the Detroit area it was the People's Community Hospital Authority, and a separate major general hospital and psychciatric institution run and funded by the County using trivially small property surtaxes. All gone now.

 

Edited March 23, 2017 by DocM