Sheriff and staff sued by jailed federal inmate
A federal inmate housed in the Perry County Jail from October 2012 to February 2013 says he was beaten by another prisoner on Feb. 5, 2013 in the jail's rec room and that the sheriff's staff knew full well that the two never should have been allowed in the same room together.
The civil lawsuit has been filed in U.S. District Court in Benton by Montez Douglas by his attorneys at the Kuehn Law Firm in Belleville.
The lawsuit names Sheriff Keith Kellerman, Major Douglas Clark, Sgt. Marshal Lilly and corrections officer Jessie Behm and other unknown sheriff's department staff members who were on shift that day.
Perry County State's Attorney David Stanton said the complaint is being turned over to the county's risk management insurance carrier.
The lawsuit "challenges the policies and procedures at the Perry County Jail that permitted corrections officers to allow an inmate, who was a known threat to the safety and security of the plaintiff, to be in the same area as the plaintiff."
It does not address whether federal marshals gave the county instructions to keep them separated.
Douglas is seeking compensatory and punitive damages from the sheriff's department "in an amount greater than $50,000" as well as damages for the injuries incurred by plaintiff as a result of the defendant's intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Other counts in the lawsuit ask for the same level of damages.
State's attorney Stanton said the process of allowing the insurance company to defend against the case is called "subrogation."
Douglas was incarcerated following a guilty plea to federal drug conspiracy and was also cooperating and assisting the U.S. government in further prosecutions against the alleged conspirators.
Douglas says that while in custody, another inmate involved in the alleged conspiracy, Ivory Dempsey, was placed in the jail.
The lawsuit says that in September or October 2012, Douglas informed jail employee Jessie Behm that an inmate at the Perry County Jail, Ivory Dempsey, was the cousin of a co-defendant (John Wysinger) in Douglas' criminal case and due to his cooperation with authorities, Ivory Dempsey posed a serious threat to Douglas' safety.
As a result, the lawsuit claims Behm input the information into a central computer system at the Perry County Jail informing all employees that Ivory Dempsey and Douglas were to be kept separated The complaint says all of the officers knew the two must be kept separated.
"Despite this knowledge, on Feb. 5, 2013, defendant Doug Clark escorted plaintiff and Ivory Dempsey to the same area of recreation and both men were confined in a small multipurpose room. "Foreseeably, on Feb. 5, 2013, Ivory Dempsey attacked and beat plaintiff in the multipurpose room, causing significant injuries," the complaint says.
The complaint alleges that the sheriff creates and enforces the policies, trains employees, supervises employees and enforces procedures for inmate movements.
"Defendants had a duty to plaintiff to protect him against violence from other inmates because imprisoning a person block his access to forms of self-protection and police protection that he would have on the outside."
Inmate lawsuits are fairly common. One of the most renown in Perry County happened back in the 1970s when an inmate escaped from the old Perry County Jail, was wounded by an officer on the sidewalk while escaping, then sued the county for allowing him to escape.