Virginia Jail Health Care Policies in Question
In a recurring theme, another inmate has died from a virulent staph infection. He spent the final ten days of his life complaining to guards about the pain he was suffering, only to be ignored, and dragged into isolation to die all alone.
Granted, this man was a criminal, and the crime he was accused of is terrible, but he had not been convicted yet, and even if he was, is that any justification for his treatment? If you say yes, then you are not any better of a human than the criminals you would leave to suffer.
Torture is not punishment. Withholding adequate health care is torture, plain and simple. Wake up Virginia, get your act together, and step into the 21st century, and modern society.
Here is the full Story from the NY Times, published yesterday.
Another Jail Death, and Mounting Questions
He lived 42 of his 48 years in the United States, and had the words “Raised American” tattooed on his shoulder. But Guido R. Newbrough was born German, and he died in November as an immigration detainee of a Virginia jail, his heart devastated by an overwhelming bacterial infection.
His family and fellow detainees say the infection went untreated, despite his mounting pleas for medical care in the 10 days before his death. Instead, after his calls for help grew insistent, detainees said, guards at the Piedmont Regional Jail in Farmville, Va., threw him to the floor, dragged him away as he cried out in pain, and locked him in an isolation cell.
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