County's burden on in-custody deaths rises sharply after record settlement
A $16 million settlement has been reached between San Diego County and the family of a 22-year-old man who died in San Diego Central Jail three years ago.
The family’s attorneys pointed to the county’s failure to preserve 55 hours of surveillance footage capturing the area outside William Hayden Schuck’s jail cell as a major factor in the case’s resolution.
The agreement, believed to be the largest wrongful death settlement in San Diego County history, resolves a lawsuit filed by the family of Schuck, who died in March 2022.
That happened to also be one month after the California State Auditor released a scathing report on the high rate of in-custody deaths at San Diego County jails. The audit examined 185 deaths within the San Diego County jail system for more than a decade through 2020, a rate that was among the highest in the state over that period.
With the new settlement, the county will have paid out about $30 million in two years, connected to just two deaths. Other lawsuits are pending.
Attorneys representing the Schuck family say numerous deficiencies highlighted in the state’s report, such as inadequate safety checks of jail cells and delays in providing medical treatment, played direct roles in Schuck’s death from dehydration and drug toxicity.
During a Wednesday news conference announcing the settlement, the attorneys also said the deletion of the video footage likely played a role in the county settling the case. They had argued in court filings that the footage could have confirmed whether or not jail staff conducted safety checks of Schuck’s cell during a period when his health rapidly declined.
Timothy Scott, one of those attorneys, said a San Diego federal judge sanctioned the county and ruled that if the case had gone to trial, jurors would be instructed that they could be allowed to assume whatever was contained in the footage would have reflected badly on the county.
“I do think that faced with that kind of jury instruction at trial, it did make the county more willing to settle,” Scott said.
A statement issued by the San Diego County Sheriff’s Office on Wednesday noted that Schuck died prior to Sheriff Kelly Martinez taking office in 2023. She was elected to her first full term in November 2022.
However, the department veteran had served as undersheriff, second in command at the office, since 2021.
In January 2022, weeks before the release of the audit, former Sheriff Bill Gore had announced that he would leave office early, on Feb. 3, 2022. The state released the jail audit that day.
“Since that time, significant improvements have been made to our jail system,” officials said in Wednesday’s statement. “Much more is needed, which will require significant investment from the county of San Diego.”
But the lengthy statement also pointed out that the settlement funds will come out of the Sheriff’s Office budget and the department “had no participation or input” on the county’s decision to settle.
Officials went on to cite results over the last year, during which San Diego County jails recorded the lowest number of in-custody deaths in more than a decade, with a 65% reduction in overdoses. There also were zero suicides in 2024, for the first time in more than 20 years.
“The Sheriff’s Office remains committed to learning from the past,” officials said near the conclusion of the statement, “while continuing forward progress and ensuring that past deficiencies are not repeated,”
That comes too late for Schuck, however, who was arrested on March 10, 2022 on suspicion of driving under the influence. He died less than a week later.
Attorneys say that upon his arrest, he displayed clear signs of intoxication and withdrawal that should have resulted in medical treatment, but he was instead placed in a cell without a mattress, where he was “forgotten” for days, according to attorney Michelle Angeles.
The day before his March 16 death, Angeles said he was found naked with sores on his body, while food and feces were strewn about his cell. During a court appearance that day, he was unable to even confirm his name, leading a judge to order that he be medically screened, according to the family’s lawsuit.
The Schucks’ attorneys say that medical screening never occurred.
The complaint states that despite the drugs found in his system after his death, there were no indications that he used drugs while in jail or had interactions with any other inmates prior to his death.
Along with the monetary component, Scott said the settlement includes an agreement to institute changes to the county’s training program for detention and correctional officers, though many of those proposed changes were being finalized.
The $16 million figure exceeds a $15 million settlement reached last year between the county and the family of Elisa Serna, who died in 2019 at the Las Colinas women’s jail in Santee.
Source – Indonesia News
