A Minnesota family is suing a county jail alleging their son died in prison after staff refused to provide him with medical attention.
Lucas Bellamy, 40, died in July 2022 three days after he had been arrested by the Hennepin county sheriff’s department. Bellamy’s family says that jail staff ignored their son’s desperate pleas for medical attention and signs that he was in agonizing pain.
“They watched, the clock ticked, minute by minute – until finally there was nothing left of him,” said Colleen Bellamy, Lucas Bellamy’s mother, during a 23 January news conference, according to Minnesota Public Radio. She said that her son struggled with alcohol and opioid addiction and was in and out of rehab for most of his adult life.
Bellamy was arrested in Hennepin county outside Minneapolis after a high-speed chase and was charged with fleeing police. He also faced existing charges of felony drug and firearm possession, driving while intoxicated, stealing property and multiple driving violations.
Upon his arrest, Bellamy informed police that he had ingested a bag of drugs and was taken to the hospital, where he was monitored and released with instructions for jail staff to bring him back to the hospital if he developed any new, concerning symptoms.
Nine hours after leaving the hospital, Bellamy became ill and started vomiting. Jail staff attributed his symptoms to possible withdrawal. He asked staff to administer Narcan, the drug used to treat opioid overdose, but the medication was not administered.
Bellamy was moved to a private cell, where he refused food. Surveillance footage shows Bellamy crawling around his cell that evening and keeling in pain as county staff observe him. He pleaded with staff to bring him to the hospital.
The next morning, a nurse gave Bellamy a portion of anti-acid medication. By noon, Bellamy was found unresponsive, lying facedown on the floor. An autopsy would show that he died of a perforated bowel.
An attorney from the family said that Bellamy “endured unimaginable pain and suffering”.
“Lucas should be here today with his family, and he is not because of the deliberate indifference exhibited by those who were charged with caring for him,” said attorney Jeff Storms in a statement.
The lawsuit accuses the Hennepin county jail as having the highest number of deaths since 2015 than any other detention facility in the state. An investigation by NBC affiliate KARE found that there had been 11 deaths in the jail between 2015 and 2021.
Along with Hennepin county and the Hennepin Healthcare system, the lawsuit also named three nurses and a sheriff’s deputy who works at the jail as defendants. The sheriff’s department said it cannot comment on the litigation and expressed sympathy for Bellamy’s family in a public statement.
“We remain committed to professionally serving all people in our facilities and under our care with compassion, dignity and respect,” the statement said.
Bellamy’s father, Lou Bellamy, a prominent figure in the Saint Paul theater scene as the founder of the Penumbra Theater, told the Washington Post that the most painful thing is that “the hospital is literally right across from the jail, and somehow they couldn’t take my son there”.
During the 23 January press conference, Bellamy’s family cried and held each other as the surveillance camera footage of Bellamy in the prison was played.
“I’ve made my living as a theater director,” Lou Bellamy said at the news conference. “I know how to construct tragedy on stage. And I can tell you honestly, that I could not have built anything more callous, more disrespectful to humanity, human existence, than what I witnessed on that tape.”
