Thread: Immigrant Sues Jail, Says Conditions Led to Amputation

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/46 ... etail.html

Immigrant Sues Jail, Saying Conditions Led To Leg Amputation
Carranza-Reyes Was Detained For Being A Suspected Illegal Immigrant

POSTED: 11:39 am MDT June 22, 2005
UPDATED: 12:15 pm MDT June 22, 2005

DENVER -- A Mexican national who was detained for being a suspected illegal immigrant is suing Park County officials, claiming that he was mistreated and neglected while in jail and denied sanitary housing and medical care -- conditions that he said led to the amputation of his leg.

Immigrant Sues Jail For Illness

Moises Carranza-Reyes, 29, had a cardiac arrest, pneumonia, a staph infection and ended up in a coma after spending just eight days in the jail.

Carranza-Reyes was arrested in Rifle in March 2003, when he was a passenger in a truck with other undocumented immigrants. He was detained by agents with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and then transported to Park County Jail.

When he entered the jail, he was healthy and in good shape, his attorneys said. But when he left the Park County jail, it was a dramatically different story, they said.

His attorneys say that Carranza-Reyes became extremely sick because of the lack of care and lack of hygiene in the jail.

Carranza-Reyes had been placed with dozens of other detainees in an unheated cellblock.

Moises Carranza-Reyes was picked up in March 2003 for being a suspected illegal immigrant.

"He was forced to wear a foul-smelling, unlaundered prison uniform and a pair of flip-flops, and had to sleep on a soiled mattress between two inmates who were so severely ill that he had to feed them. The cellblock contained only two toilets, which were covered with excrement and vomit, and its floors were littered with phlegm-soaked toilet paper. Guards denied inmates' requests for cleaning supplies or soap," his attorney recounted in a press release.

Carranza-Reyes attorneys say the jail was a breeding ground for infection and provided little care to inmates. When Carranza-Reyes and other detainees tried to petition the Mexican Consulate in Denver for humane treatment, the guards took the document and destroyed it, his attorneys said.

His leg had to be amputated after infection spread to his body and his legs became black with gangrene. Portions of his lung were also removed, according to the lawsuit.

Attorneys contend that the jail simply exists to make money.

"This jail was operated as revenue-generating technique to bring money into this county and there was an attempt to make money by not providing essential services such as a clean and humane place for these prisoners -- who are not criminals," said attorney Lloyd C. Kordick.

Ultimately, Carranza-Reyes was never charged with a crime.

"This is a revenue-generating, public jail whose promotional literature routinely solicits ICE, the U.S. Marshals Service, and other counties to 'park' their overflow prisoners at the facility," the attorneys said in the release.

The federal suit, filed in February in Denver, accuses Park County officials of violating his constitutional rights. Defendants include the sheriff's department and the jail's medical staff.

Carranza-Reyes is being represented by a Washington civil rights group called Trial Lawyers for Public Justice.

"Mr. Carranza-Reyes deserves compensation not only because he lost a leg, but because the jail – a part of our American justice system – violated his fundamental rights. The stain on our justice system can be cleansed only by holding the wrongdoers accountable," said TLPJ staff attorney Adele P. Kimmel.

Park County Sheriff's officials would not comment on the case.

I still have a hard time equating illegal alein into