Jail bodycam videos released for the first time contradict initial accounts and exposes ‘a chilling disregard for human life’ that led to Maurice Monk’s death

OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA, UNITED STATES, October 10, 2023 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Newly released bodycam shows an Oakland man lying motionless and slowly dying for several days face down on his bunk at the Santa Rita Jail in Alameda County, California, before guards and nurses decided he might need help. By then, it was too late.

Oakland-based Lawyers For The People spent two years fighting with Alameda County to release more than 150 videos taken by guards’ bodycams, after initial reports attributed Maurice Monk’s Nov. 15, 2021, death to a sudden heart attack. The videos show Monk, 45, face down on his bunk motionless and unresponsive for at least three days before the guards entered his cell to check on him.

During the days prior, guards merely dropped food into his cell, and nurses from Nashville, Tenn.-based Wellpath Community Care, which has a $250 million contract with the county to provide the jail’s medical services, just tossed the medication onto the cell floor. Although the food, water and medication was untouched, his medical distress was dismissed as normal behavior.

Monk lived with hypertension, diabetes, and schizoaffective disorder.

When they finally lifted Monk’s lifeless body from his cot, the logo from his jail-issued T-shirt had transferred onto the sheet, and he was surrounded by a puddle of urine and bodily fluids.

Monk, a part-time security guard, was arrested for not wearing a mask on a public bus and arguing with the driver. He was unable to come up with the $2,500 cash bail that would have kept him out of jail.

These new details of Monk’s in-custody death are included in an amended federal civil lawsuit filed Oct. 6 in San Francisco, after his family’s civil rights attorneys, Adanté Pointer, Patrick Buelna and Ty Clarke, of Pointer & Buelna, Lawyers For The People, sifted through 10,000 official documents and hours of security and body camera footage to piece together the truth.

The civil rights lawsuit, filed on behalf of Monk’s daughter and son, include Alameda County, Nashville-based Wellpath Community Care LLC., 15 Alameda County sheriff’s deputies, nine Wellpath nurses, and a Wellpath physician’s assistant, for failing to provide adequate care.

“The people working at Santa Rita Jail denied Mr. Monk his basic humanity, and demonstrated a callous disregard for human life,” Pointer said. “And Wellpath continues to provide subpar medical services while feasting on the public’s dime.”

Monk’s family never believed the county’s death certificate claiming that Monk died of hypertensive cardiovascular disease.

“That’s not what killed Maurice Monk. It was the failure of the jail’s nurses and guards to ensure Maurice received his medications to treat his mental illness and chronic high blood pressure,” Pointer said. “They literally did nothing more than stare at him and throw food and medications into his cell like he was an animal in a pen at the zoo. Despite the obvious crisis, not a single guard or nurse thought enough about Mr. Monk to call for help.”

An Internal Affairs investigation found that some deputies forged record in addition to failing to recognize abundant signs that Monk was in medical distress, according to the lawsuit.

Santa Rita Jail is operating under federal oversight focusing on the high death rate among inmates; 68 men have died in custody since 2014, including 11 since Monk died, making Santa Rita Jail one of the deadliest jails in the country.

According to Monk’s sister, Elvira Monk, “the jail’s neglect stole Maurice from us. If not for their utter neglect my brother would still be here today to go to his son’s upcoming high school graduation, hug his daughter and play with his nieces and nephews.”

The lawsuit was filed at U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, in San Francisco; The Estate of Maurice Monk v. Alameda County, Wellpath Community Care LLC, et al, 3:22-cv-04037-TSH (Oct. 6, 2023).

About Pointer & Buelna, LLP, Lawyers for the People: Civil rights attorneys Adanté Pointer and Patrick Buelna started their law firm to give people a chance against large institutions like the police, government, corporations and insurance companies. They have secured many of the largest trial verdicts and settlements in these practice areas.

Robert Frank
Newsroom Public Relations
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KTVU Fox 2 coverage: 'Oakland man left for dead at Santa Rita Jail, exclusive video shows'

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