Our sympathies to the family of Debra Ingram Duffie. I thought I had brought up an old email by mistake when I saw the words Inmate Dies at Gregg County Jail. Surely this was a story about one of others who’ve died there since 2010, like Amy Lynn and Aaron, and previously, Misty Beene. This year, Bobby Madewell died there, no doubt also under the tender mercies and neglectful care of Gregg County’s medical staff and notorious Dr. Lewis Browne. Now, a new person has died, but they managed to get her off site so technically she wasn’t a jail death. Still the same because we suspect if she’d gotten decent care, if she’d been on the outside, she might have lived. Our sympathies to Ms. Duffie’s family. Please tell them to email or call Texas Jail Project.

We must remember Craig Morris. He was the human being who was allowed to die on a cold concrete floor at the Dallas County Jail because jailers didn’t think he needed medical care. They said they saw him but thought the floor “must have felt good to him.” But others saw this: a man who was at various times “confused, shaking and seemingly in pain. He was wheezing, hacking, breathing with difficulty, coughing up yellow-green phlegm, soiling himself and slumped over the shower floor.” God help you if you need medical help in the Dallas County Jail because the jailers won’t.

San Antonio Current writer Michael Barajas is leaving the paper and pursuing other goals, and we will miss his throrough coverage of issues related to inmates in the jails of San Antonio. This last story reveals so much about the inner workings of an understaffed and dysfunctional jail that it reads like a book, but Barajas also does a smpathetic and intelligent analysis of a young man’s life and tragic death. We can hope that Tommy Taylor’s seven hours in the jail will lead to a better jail, but we also have to hope the Current finds a reporter/writer who can cover stories with the passion Barajas brought to these cases.

April was 36 years old and 22 weeks along in her pregnancy when she was arrested and taken to the Bosque County Jail, on May 2nd. She died there May 4th. Even though her death has been ruled a suicide, her sister and other family and friendshave questions about how this could happen. As in all similar jail deaths, the Texas Rangers are investigating, but Texas Jail Project has concerns about that investigation. Please email diana@texasjailproject.org if you have any information.

Texas Jail Project and others protested in San Antonio last fall, to call attention to the death of Tommy Taylor who died in the Bexar County Jail just six hours after turning himself in, August 21, 2012. Now comes a San Antonio Current story that a jailer did not do the mandatory cell check–jailers are required to check on “isolated inmates” in solitary cells every 30 minutes–and that might well have saved Taylor’s life. Jailer Ernesto Flores is accused of hiding that fact by falsifying the records so that it would appear he did check on Taylor. Another black mark on the Bexar County Jail–and this one resulted in an unnecessary death of a young man who, whatever his problems, was a father to his little girl and beloved of his whole family.

Maurice Chammah’s story tells how the family has gone to the courts for justice after the death of a greatly beloved 29-year-old son in Corpus Christi. This lawsuit will, we hope, shine a light on the horrible neglect that Greg Cheek suffered while in the Nueces County Jail. Despite training and safeguards, jailers there failed to see past mental illness and blue paint covering Greg, and they ignored his symptoms for days and days.
Click on “Continue Reading” to see the Texas Tribune story. Go to the Voices section of our website to see tributes to Greg that we posted when we found out about his death back in 2011.

This Longview News Journal article examines some of the many complications that occur when jails hold people with mental conditions and medications that are not on “their list,” but Amy Lynn’s mother puts forth a straightforward idea: couldn’t jail staff act with common sense “when inmates exhibit seizures, become incoherent, and howl,” like her daughter did?
The lawsuit again the Gregg County Jail has ended with a settlement, but the pain and questioning continues. Texas Jail Project, the Cowling family and many other families want to see officials work together, to find ways to prevent suffering and deaths in the future.

August 22nd is when 30-year-old Tommy Reed Taylor turned himself into the Bexar County Jail for possession and DUI warrants. He died within 7 hours of going there. We need a serious investigation of Tommy’s death.
We had a great peaceful protest in San Antonio, Tuesday, October 23rd. The family and Margarita McAuliffe of Moms United to End the War on Drugs have led more protests since then.
For more info about the upcoming protest on his birthday, Monday, November 5th, go to Facebook events: Birthday Vigil for Tommy at http://www.facebook.com/events/212384808894724/?fref=ts
Or email his sister Toni at toniescut@yahoo.com

Thomas “Tommy” Reed Taylor died at the Bexar County Detention Center on August 22, 2012. He was 30 years old.
Tommy’s sister, Tonie is asking anyone in Bexar county who might have been in jail on that day, to please contact her. See her posting
on the Texas Jail Project Facebook page or email her at toniescut@yahoo.com.

By Celinda Emison, May 24, 2011, Abilene Reporter News A  class-action lawsuit targeting Taylor County Sheriff Les Bruce and other jail employees has been filed in federal court by several former inmates and the families of two inmates who died at the county jail. The suit alleges that inmates were routinely denied medical treatment and