Georgia sheriff ‘cleans house’ after mentally ill prisoner allegedly eaten alive by bed bugs
Barnini Chakraborty
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A Georgia sheriff has accepted the resignations of three of his top deputies following disturbing allegations that a prisoner suffering from mental health problems was eaten alive by bed bugs.
Fulton County Sheriff Patrick Labat said he asked and accepted the resignations of Chief Jailer John Jackson; Assistant Chief Jailer Derrick Singleton; and Lt. Col. Adam Lee, assistant chief jailer for the Criminal Investigative Division.
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“It’s clear to me that’s time, past time, to clean house,” Labat said Monday afternoon.
The announcement comes after the death of Lashawn Thompson, a 35-year-old homeless man with a history of mental illness who was found sleeping in a park near a childcare center in Atlanta last year. He was arrested and charged with simple battery after allegedly spitting on an officer who then took him to Fulton County Jail. His only possessions at the time of his arrest included a spoon, a green cup, and a blue backpack with a dinosaur design.
Three months after Thompson was taken in, he was found dead in the jail’s psychiatric wing, covered in sores and bites from bed bugs and lice so severe that his family could not recognize him. Pictures from inside the jail showed Thompson being held in a filthy cell with dirt and grime coating the floors, walls, and toilet.
“The jail cell Mr. Thompson was housed in was not fit for a diseased animal,” the family’s lawyer, Michael Harper, said. “He did not deserve this.”
Harper added that jail records documented Thompson’s deteriorating health but did nothing to help him.
“They literally watched his health decline until he died,” Harper said. “When his body was found, one of the detention officers refused to administer CPR because, in her words, she was ‘freaked out.'”
The sheriff’s office said two investigations are being launched into Thompson’s death: one by the Atlanta Police Department and another internal investigation. The results will be given to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for review.
“Most importantly, we want to, once again, extend our sincere condolences to the family of Mr. Lashawn Thompson,” Labat said. “The final investigative report will not ease the family’s grief or bring their loved one back, but it is my hope and expectation that it provides a full, accurate, and transparent account of the facts surrounding Mr. Thompson’s death so that it provides all of the answers they are seeking and deserve.”
While he praised the sheriff for “cleaning house,” Harper questioned the timing.
“The sheriff was aware of Lashawn Thompson’s death back in September and the conditions in which he died back in September,” Harper told 11Alive on Monday night. “So we do have to wonder if the international attention to this case is what made the sheriff make the changes.”
Thompson’s family plans to file a lawsuit against the sheriff and detention officers if an investigation they commissioned determines Thompson’s death was due to the bug bites. The results are expected within the next two months. Thompson’s family is not only demanding someone be held accountable for his death but also that the jail be shut down.
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The Fulton County Medical Examiner lists Thompson’s cause of death as “undetermined” but did note a severe bedbug infestation.
Separately, the sheriff’s office said it would take “immediate action” in updating the dilapidated conditions of the jail, including spending $500,000 to treat the bed bug, lice, and other rodent infestation. It has also promised to add more staff to the mental health unit and transfer more than 600 inmates to other counties to alleviate overcrowding.
Dr. Home Venters, a federal court monitor for health services in jails, said Thompson’s death underscored the message that mentally ill people “need treatment, not jail.”
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“When they get into jail, they actually are further removed from the psychiatric care that they need,” Venters told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “Somehow the framing that a person has a mental health problem in a jail means that they are often just locked in a cell. And not only are they deprived of the basic psychiatric care they need, they also may be deprived of the medical care they need.”
Members of Thompson’s family and other supporters are planning a rally at the jail on Thursday.