A federal judge has dismissed a lawsuit against Tarrant County and a jail commissary company, ruling there wasn't enough evidence to show they are responsible for the death of a man who overdosed on fentanyl behind bars.
Trelynn Wormley died in 2022, months into his jail stay. An investigation found that a commissary worker, Aaliyah Lyles, smuggled in the drugs that killed him, according to the lawsuit.
Wormley鈥檚 mother, Cassandra Johnson, sued Tarrant County and the commissary company, alleging the sheriff鈥檚 office allows 鈥渄eadly drugs to come into and run rampant throughout its correctional facilities.鈥� The lawsuit also accused the jail of disregarding incarcerated people鈥檚 medical and mental health issues.
U.S. District Judge Reed O鈥機onnor ruled on July 11 that the lawsuit failed to prove the jail has any de facto policy that lets drugs in.
鈥淲hile Plaintiffs generally allege that jail officers aided inmates with smuggling drugs into the jail, they provide only three specific instances where jail officers smuggled contraband,鈥� O鈥機onnor wrote. 鈥淧laintiffs also claim that Tarrant County allowed Keefe employees to smuggle drugs, but they provide only one instance of a Keefe employee doing that.鈥�
According to the lawsuit, one jailer failed to search someone鈥檚 bag and allowed prohibited items into the jail. Another brought in restricted medication, and another brought 鈥渦nauthorized cleaning chemicals into the facility鈥� and 鈥済ave these chemicals to an inmate.鈥�
These examples 鈥� and several other drug-related deaths over an eight-year span 鈥� were not numerous enough or similar enough to Wormley鈥檚 case to show a pattern of wrongdoing, O'Connor wrote.
O鈥機onnor also released the Keefe commissary company from the lawsuit. They had no way of knowing Lyles would smuggle drugs and were not negligent in hiring her, he decided.
Lyles pleaded guilty to manufacturing or delivering a controlled substance last year and was placed on 10 years of probation, county criminal documents show.
Cassandra Johnson, Wormley鈥檚 mother, has become a frequent speaker at Tarrant County Commissioners Court meetings in Fort Worth, as well as at the Texas Commission on Jail Standards in Austin. She has demanded answers for why her son died and why his death never got a proper outside investigation.
More than 20 deaths in Tarrant County Jail custody, including Wormley鈥檚, never got the third-party investigations required by the state. The Tarrant County Sheriff鈥檚 Office assigned the investigations to the Fort Worth Police Department, which never did any investigating, police confirmed last year. They just reviewed the sheriff鈥檚 own internal investigations.
Tarrant County has spent more than $4.3 million in legal payouts since 2022, in cases involving deaths and allegations of abuse and neglect in the jail.
Earlier this month, O鈥機onnor also dismissed a lawsuit against the doctor in charge of jail medical care in 2020. The lawsuit alleged he failed to care for Chasity Congious, a woman who gave birth alone in her cell and lost her baby Zenorah 10 days later.
Congious received a $1.2 million settlement last year in a lawsuit against Tarrant County as a whole. It is the largest settlement in county history.
In December, the county agreed to pay $775,000 to settle a lawsuit from the family of Kelly Masten, a woman with intellectual disabilities and a severe seizure disorder. The lawsuit alleged jailers let Masten injure herself during repeated seizures in an unpadded cell. She survived, but she had to be placed in a medically induced coma once she was released from jail and spent weeks in the hospital, according to the lawsuit.
Another significant jail death lawsuit is still pending. Anthony Johnson Jr.鈥檚 family sued last year after the Marine veteran died of asphyxiation in custody. Jailers had pepper sprayed him, and one knelt on his back for more than a minute while Johnson said he couldn鈥檛 breathe, video of the incident shows.
O鈥機onnor, who is also presiding over that lawsuit, dismissed claims against Tarrant County in February. Similar to the Wormley lawsuit, he ruled the Johnson family鈥檚 lawsuit failed to prove that county policies and procedures led to Johnson鈥檚 death.
The Johnson lawsuit continues against individual jailers accused of involvement in Johnson鈥檚 death, including two who have been indicted for murder.
Got a tip? Email Miranda Suarez at msuarez@kera.org.
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