Judge dismisses wrongful death lawsuit against county jail

A federal judge has dismissed a wrongful death lawsuit against the Doña Ana County Detention Center.

Ramon Hernandez was arrested on Feb. 23, 2005 for trespassing. While in police custody, he had a seizure. Police took him to MountainView Regional Medical Center, where he was treated and released. He was then taken to the jail.

He was released from jail the next day, but found on Feb. 25 lying on the floor in the public restroom in the jail’s lobby. He was not wearing shoes.

A jail staffer gave Hernandez shoes and he left, but he was found hours later dead in a parking lot adjacent to the jail property. The Office of the Medical Investigator said he died from a seizure disorder.

His family filed suit in September, alleging that jail staff denied Hernandez the medical care and supervision he needed while incarcerated due to the staffers’ “deliberate indifference.”

U.S. Magistrate Judge William Lynch dismissed the lawsuit against the county Friday, saying Hernandez’s family failed to prove that county staffers were deliberately indifferent to Hernandez’s medical needs. In addition, he found that there was no evidence of negligence on the part of law enforcement officers.

The dismissal is good news for the county, whose jail has been plagued by scandal in recent years. The December 2005 murder of inmate Philip Gantz, who shared a cell with three other inmates, is still unsolved and casts a cloud over the jail. There was a riot at the jail last year, but the county has made many security improvements since.