Lashawn Thompson died in a jail cell in the psychiatric wing of one of the country’s largest lockups based in Atlanta, the Fulton County Jail. (Photos from family attorney Michael Harper)
Lawyers for the family of an inmate with schizophrenia who died in a filthy Atlanta jail cell called for a federal investigation after they said he was “eaten alive by bedbugs” while jailers and medical staff allegedly did nothing to prevent it.
Lashawn Thompson died in September while being housed in a cell infested with bedbugs, lice and roaches in the psychiatric ward of the Fulton County Jail. He had over 1,000 bites on his face, eyes, neck, ears, and body, and medical staff and jailers didn’t check on him for days, even though they were supposed to check on him daily, the family’s lawyers said.
“This is God awful when you think about it,” said civil rights attorney Benjamin Crump, who joined the family on Thursday for a news conference. “What happened to Lashawn Thompson is a human rights violation. You can not call it anything but. Even the sheriff agreed. It was deplorable conditions, like a Third-World country.
“And so we ain’t going let nobody pass the baton. We want justice for Lashawn.”
The news came as U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., announced he’s launched an inquiry into conditions of incarceration after Thompson’s death and the death of Joshua McLemore, who died after 20 days naked, dehydrated, malnourished, and alone in a filthy padded isolation cell in Indiana, according to a lawsuit.
Ossoff, who serves as chairman of the Senate Human Rights Subcommittee, wrote a letter to U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland seeking federal aid.
“The Department of Justice has an affirmative obligation to safeguard the civil rights of incarcerated people, whether they are held in Federal, state, or local custody,” Ossoff wrote. “Additionally, the Federal government provides hundreds of millions of dollars in funding to state and local prisons and jails through an array of grant programs, including through the DOJ Bureau of Justice Assistance, and thus has the responsibility to oversee the use of those resources.”
A message to the DOJ seeking comment was not immediately returned.
Crump said former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick would fund an independent autopsy to learn more about how Thompson died.
Fulton County Sheriff Patrick Labat, who oversees the jail, joined the family and lawyers at their request at the news conference on Thursday and outlined recent actions taken, including over $5.3 million in emergency funding to address the “urgent needs at the Rice Street facility” and $800,000 for a study for a new jail.
In a statement posted in full on FOX5 Atlanta’s website, he said his office is reviewing proposals for a new medical provider for the jail after the previous one discontinued its contract.
He said the jail has been “operating in “crisis mode for decades.”
“Mr. Thompson’s death was an inexcusable and unconscionable tragedy,” he said. “I understand and accept my responsibility to provide accountability and transparency in making sure something like this never happens again.”
Earlier this week, Labat said he accepted the resignations of the facility’s executive staff. During the news conference, he said two staff members opted to retire, while a third resigned. He vowed to “continue to hold people accountable.”
He said officials spent $500,000 to clean and sanitize the jail, and authorities transferred more than 650 inmates from the facility to others around the state to relieve overcrowding.
The Fulton County Jail has been the subject of lawsuits and a federal consent decree regarding the conditions of inmates in custody. The nonprofit Southern Center for Human Rights sued the county four times over jail conditions. The most recent case filed in 2019 about women in custody was settled, but the nonprofit filed a contempt motion saying the agreement made was not being met.
“Although Sheriff Labat claims to have humanitarian objectives, what we see is gross neglect of the human beings in his care,” Tiffany Roberts, the nonprofit’s public policy director, said in an email to Law&Crime. “Through refusing to timely address the needs of incarcerated people and remaining singularly focused on increasing Fulton County’s incarceration footprint through building and acquiring new jails, he is ensuring prolonged human rights violations in Fulton County.”
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