Booked and Buried Archives - Northwest Public Broadcasting

Booked And Buried: Case Of Lorenzo Hayes Shows It’s Not Easy Getting Answers To Jail Deaths

By Austin Jenkins December 27, 2019

A barbed wire fence encloses the Columbia County Jail yard in St. Helens, Ore., Saturday, March 30, 2019. CREDIT: Bradley Parks/OPB

In other words, jail deaths are a local matter. It’s up to the jail director, the sheriff or other county officials to decide how an in-custody death should be investigated. The state has no role and no oversight of that investigation. The result is jail death investigations have no guarantee of independence, oversight or necessarily accountability.Read More

He Died By Suicide In Solitary Confinement. Now Washington Will Pay $500K In Settlement

By Austin Jenkins November 13, 2019

In 2014, Morgan Bluehorse died by suicide in his isolation cell at the Airway Heights Corrections Center near Spokane. His family has settled its lawsuit against the state for $500,000 CREDIT: WASHINGTON DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS

The state of Washington has agreed to pay $500,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by the family of a 29-year-old man who died by suicide in an isolation cell at the Airway Heights Corrections Center near Spokane in May 2014.Read More

Booked And Buried: Jail Suicide Epidemic Doesn’t Extend To Northwest Prisons

By Conrad Wilson November 6, 2019

Between 2008 and 2018, suicide accounted for 47% of jail deaths with a known cause in Oregon and Washington, according to an investigation by OPB, KUOW and the Northwest News Network. But an analysis shows the region’s prisons aren’t plagued by the same crisis.Read More

Booked And Buried: Aging Northwest Jails Endanger Lives, But Replacing Them Is Controversial

By Austin Jenkins October 17, 2019

Jailhouse graffiti is common in the Mason County Jail which opened in 1985. CREDIT: Austin Jenkins/N3

Between 2008 and 2018, more than 300 people died after being taken to a county jail in Washington or Oregon, according to an investigation earlier this year by OPB, KUOW and the Northwest News Network. Nearly half died by suicide.Read More

Suicides In Northwest Jails Highlight Risk For Native American Inmates

By Austin Jenkins June 5, 2019

Vicky Jefferson holds a framed montage of photos of her daughter Shannon who died by suicide in the Whatcom County Jail. CREDIT: SARAH WALLACE

Deaths in the Whatcom County Jail highlight two stark realities: Native Americans are disproportionately more likely to be in Northwest jails. As a result, they are also more likely to die in jail. Read More

Report Says Locking Up Mentally Ill, Drug-Addicted People Results In Jail Deaths

By Austin Jenkins May 21, 2019

Jail cell in Cowlitz County, Washington. CREDIT: AUSTIN JENKINS/N3

The practice of locking up people who are chronically sick, mentally ill or drug addicted in under-resourced city, county and regional jails in Washington is resulting in inmate deaths and a failure to “treat all people humanely, respectfully, and safely,” according to a new report by the statewide nonprofit law firm Columbia Legal Services.Read More

Booked And Buried: After Dehydration Death, Grieving Father And Jail Chief Form Surprising Bond

By Austin Jenkins April 17, 2019

Fred Farris, the father of Keaton Farris, and Island County Jail Chief Jose Briones pose together on the Coupeville Wharf. CREDIT: AUSTIN JENKINS/N3

Four years ago this month, Keaton Farris died naked, dehydrated and malnourished on the floor of an isolation cell in the Island County Jail on Whidbey Island. Farris, who was bipolar and in the throes of a mental health crisis, had been arrested 18 days earlier for failing to appear in court for allegedly stealing and cashing a $355 check. An investigation later found Read More

Booked And Buried: Suicide Is The Leading Cause Of Death In Northwest Jails

By Conrad Wilson April 4, 2019

A molded-plastic bunk in a maximum security cell at the Clark County Jail in Vancouver, Washington, on March 14, 2019. The molded-form of the bunk makes it impossible to tie things like bedsheets to the bunk. CREDIT: Bryan M. Vance/OPB

Over the past decade, at least 122 people have died by suicide in county jails across Oregon and Washington. Suicide, specifically hanging, is by far the leading single cause of deaths in the region’s jails. It accounts for nearly half of all cases with a known cause of death.Read More