A federal lawsuit filed Thursday alleges Dakota County jail employees left a 22-year-old Farmington man in a padded cell naked and covered in his own feces, blood, urine and vomit for nearly 20 hours while his mental and physical health deteriorated to the point he was hospitalized in critical condition.
Caleb Duffy was arrested by Hastings police on suspicion of domestic assault shortly after 6:30 p.m. July 4, 2022. Duffy, who has mental illness and diabetes, was removed from the cell two days later and taken to Region’s Hospital.
Duffy was diagnosed with diabetic ketoacidosis and kept intubated and sedated for five days. He spent nearly two weeks in intensive care before being transferred to the hospital’s psychiatry unit. His hospital bills totaled more than $220,000.
Brian Duffy, Caleb’s father and limited legal guardian, filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court that names as defendants Dakota County and 10 of its corrections staff, as well as the jail’s medical provider, Advanced Correctional Healthcare Inc., and three of its employees. It alleges two counts of negligence and violations of the Eighth and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution “either maliciously or with reckless disregard.”
“This case involves a shocking lack of care by the defendant corrections and jail medical staff,” Ryan Vettleson, an attorney at Storms Dworak, which is representing Duffy’s family, said in a statement. “No person should be subjected to such willful indifference.”
The lawsuit alleges Duffy’s “obvious and severe symptoms he displayed of a medical emergency were repeatedly ignored.”
Jail video surveillance shows Duffy in a psychotic state in a padded cell, naked and rolling around in his own feces, blood, urine and vomit, the lawsuit says. Duffy injured himself severely by repeatedly hitting his head against an unpadded area of the cell.
“Mr. Duffy’s plight was so severe that it is extremely difficult to watch any of it on video, but the video goes on for hours on end — and the individuals present at the time did nothing,” Vettleson said.
Dakota County Sheriff Joe Leko and a Dakota County spokeswoman both said they cannot comment on pending litigation.
“Know that the safety and care of our detainees have always been and continue to be top priorities in our jail,” Leko said in a statement, adding that the Dakota County Attorney’s Office is representing the county and employees named in the claim.
Father informed jail
Prior to the incident, Duffy was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, autism anxiety, major depressive disorder, ADHD and Type I diabetes, the lawsuit says. He previously had been hospitalized several times for diabetic ketoacidosis and mental health crisis intervention. He was civilly committed for mental illness in January 2021, a commitment that was continued six months later and remains in effect, court records show.
The lawsuit claims that Duffy’s father called the jail repeatedly starting around 9 p.m. July 4 to inform staff that his son was a vulnerable adult with mental illness and diabetes and in need of his medication and hospitalization. However, jail staff “took no action” to get Duffy his insulin until around 5:35 a.m. July 5, when a deputy saw him pacing in the holding cell and yelling that he was dying.
After Duffy told the deputy that he had diabetes and needed his blood sugar checked, it was found to be “dangerously high,” the lawsuit continues.
About a half-hour later, Duffy was seen by a nurse from Advanced Correctional Healthcare, a Tennessee-based private corporation licensed to do business in Minnesota. The nurse administered Duffy 14 units of fast-acting insulin.
Duffy’s father met with a different nurse around 8:10 a.m. July 5, giving her his son’s medical history information. He returned around 10:45 a.m. with Duffy’s prescribed medication: insulin and Gabapentin, an anticonvulsant medication that is used off-label to treat anxiety.
Gabapentin withdrawal symptoms can appear in 12 hours and can include anxiety, pain, agitation, disorientation, confusion, combativeness, hallucinations and paranoid delusions, the lawsuit says.
However, jail medical staff never administered Gabapentin to or initiated a withdrawal protocol for Duffy, “demonstrating deliberate indifference to Duffy’s serious medical needs and medical negligence,” the lawsuit alleges.
‘I’ll just hit my head’
Duffy refused the fast-acting insulin around noon on July 5. A nurse reported that Duffy acknowledged understanding the ramifications of refusing his insulin, and then he “sat down and started slamming the back of his head against the cement and said, ‘I’ll just hit my head until I die,’” the lawsuit says.
Duffy was put on suicide watch, meaning corrections staff were required to perform well-being checks on him at least every 15 minutes.
About three hours later, Duffy stripped off his gown and began vomiting and ramming his head into the walls of his padded cell. A deputy noted that Duffy was screaming that he “needs a doctor.”
Surveillance video shows that although Duffy had urinated and defecated in his cell and repeatedly vomited, a nurse who administered insulin noted no distress or other concerns with him, the lawsuit claims.
Duffy remained in his cell for the next 19½ hours as his psychosis and physical health worsened, according to the lawsuit. Between 6 a.m. and around 8:30 a.m. the next day, Duffy hit his head on the cell’s walls or floor 22 times. At one point, he hit his head against a metal grate so hard it caused a bleeding wound.
A nurse arrived at Duffy’s cell at about 8:45 a.m. and noted “some blood on walls, floor and drain,” the lawsuit says. She entered the cell with two deputies and took his blood sugar, which was so high the machine could not register it.
The nurse left the cell to call an ambulance, “but watched him on video surveillance and saw him repeatedly sit up and fall backwards, hitting his head on the ground, leaving a bloody mark each time,” the lawsuit continues.
At approximately 9 a.m., Duffy was carried out of the cell and loaded into an ambulance.
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