DUCHESNE COUNTY, Utah, Sept. 26, 2017 (Gephardt Daily) — The Utah Attorney General’s office has charged a jail nurse with negligent homicide in the 2016 death of an inmate.
According to a probable cause statement, defendant Jana Clyde, a nurse at the Duchesne County Jail, was told of the deteriorating condition of prisoner Madison Jensen, “… and did not provide intervention or followup care to the victim despite being the onsite medical staff, and the victim died as a result.”
The 21-year-old victim, from Roosevelt, was booked on Nov. 27 for internal consumption/possession of both marijuana and heroin, and possession of drug paraphernalia, the statement says.
Asked if she was going through drug withdrawal, Jensen replied that she was, and that “… her drug of choice was heroin,” and that she also used prescription medicine to treat her blood pressure.
Clyde was assigned to get the victim’s prescription approved, which she did, and to evaluate her health, which Clyde reportedly did not do.
“Despite being very ill with both vomiting and diarrhea, defendant took no action to address this condition, and the victim was placed back into the general population of the jail,” the probable cause statement says. On Nov. 29, a deputy reported that Jensen’s condition had worsened.
“The deputy reported the victim’s deteriorating condition to defendant, who did not act
to treat or follow up with the victim’s deteriorating condition and medical needs, even though the victim was then moved to a monitored cell with video surveillance away from the general inmate population,” the statement says.
On Nov. 30, the deputy had to help the victim take her medication, and reported to Clyde that Jensen could not get off her bed.
“Defendant made no assessment, did not see the victim, nor made any attempt to check on the welfare of the victim,” the statement says.
“December 1, 2016, the victim was found unresponsive in her jail cell and she was pronounced dead. Ultimately the medical examiner determined the victim died of a cardiac arrhythmia due to dehydration, in the setting of opiate withdrawal.”
So sad. The employees of Corrections do not care about people who have commited crime. Its depressing because I know Human Beings who are incarcerated and try to receive medical help. The officers and staff in Utah- judge and look down on perps. Therefore, prisoners are neglected.
I think that’s a really unfair generalization of every person who works in a jail system.. I happen to know several people work with inmates regularly and are very caring, and compassionate.
It’s like me saying every person incarcerated is a bad person.
My father worked as a correction officer for 17 years. He was one of the only people in his jail that the inmates actually respected. I know that there are SO many corrections officers that are terrible and they truly do not care about those incarcerated. Everybody makes mistakes in this life. And it is really sad that they are treated so poorly by those of authority. I feel terrible for this poor family and all those others that suffer at the hands of power hungry humans. It is those who are power hungry that give all corrections officers a bad name. Not all of them are this way. My father never would have let this girl die or even get to the pony of illness like she did.
Bring a nurse myself for 31yrs, I can’t imagine any nurse being told a human being or animal for that matter had deteriorating condition and not immediately taking action to evaluate and get immediate help! That’s the number “1” top priority of our job!