Lebanon County pays nearly $5M over heroin withdrawal death in jail
https://readingeagle.com/news/article/county-pays-nearly-5m-over-heroin-withdrawal-death-in-jail
Victoria “Tori” Herr died after four days suffering from heroin withdrawal in jail.
However, that wasn’t yet the issue when 18-year-old Victoria “Tori” Herr was arrested for the first time on March 27, 2015, after police looking for her boyfriend found drugs in their apartment. Herr told intake staff at the Lebanon County Correctional Facility she used 10 bags of heroin a day, and confided to a cellmate that she feared the withdrawal process would be tough.
She went through severe bouts of vomiting and diarrhea over the next four days, and was given Ensure, water and adult diapers, according to the lawsuit. But she could not keep the fluids down, and collapsed of apparent dehydration as she was being brought back to her cell from the medical unit on March 31. She died in a hospital on April 5.
“Anyone who looked at her would have known that she was very sick and that she needed attention,” said Jonathan Feinberg, a civil rights lawyer in Philadelphia who represents her family. “There was a complete disregard for her needs, which can only be tied back to the fact that she was addicted to drugs.”
He said a simple trip to the emergency room for intravenous fluids would have saved her life.
The family settled their civil rights and wrongful death claims with the county this month for $4.75 million, he said. Feinberg believes medical staff lied about taking Herr’s vital signs shortly before the collapse, given that she never regained consciousness.
Lawyer Hugh O’Neill, who represents Warden Robert Karnes, two nurses and other jail staff, said no county employees acknowledged any wrongdoing as part of the settlement. “The case was resolved amicably,” he said, declining to say this week if the county had reviewed or revised any policies in the wake of Herr’s death.
Increasingly, policymakers see jail and prison as an opportune time to intervene and offer medical help for people with opioid addictions.
In the three years since her death, Pennsylvania Secretary of Corrections John Wetzel has started offering methadone and other drugs approved to treat opioid addiction.
“The tide is turning. I think very slowly, but surely, there’s a lot of entities that have had to really look in the mirror, and ask how are they dealing with this medical condition,” said Steve Seitchik, who runs the Medication Assisted Treatment program in the state prisons.
Nationally, some studies show that about 25 percent of people entering local jails are addicted to opioids, according to Sally Friedman, vice president for legal advocacy of the National Action Center, a New York-based nonprofit. Only a fraction of the facilities offer medication as part of a treatment plan, but the number is growing, she said.
In Pennsylvania, Wetzel’s department now offers grants for county jails to offer medication-assisted treatment as well.
Herr, severely dehydrated, had begged for lemonade in a phone call with her mother on March 30. Stephanie Moyer tried to visit later that day, but was turned away and told her daughter was fine. The next time she saw Herr — who graduated high school despite her addiction — she was on a ventilator.
Feinberg said he hopes the lawsuit will remind even the smallest counties they have a duty to care for inmates battling addiction.
“The days of viewing people addicted to drugs as junkies unworthy of sympathy and care, are long past,” Feinberg said. “It’s a very short chain of events that leads to death.”
Filed under: General Problems
Tori Herr can not be brought back and money can not stop the painful memories of how she was treated after literally begging for help from her captors. I am glad that her family did win the suit. I AM tired of ALL people including pain management patients being treated as less than human and “deserving” of what happens to us whether addicted to a substance OR DEPENDENT on opiate medication to manage pain from injury, pain generating disease and doctor surgery screw up which is far too common than admitted. I am in FAR worse pain, unable to continue to operate the business I started over 35 years ago. and STILL waiting for SS disability I have paid in for over 40 years My wife and I have spent ALL of our life savings both trying to find :”some” pain management relief through kratom and items such as CBD oil (no thc in NC) and simply paying recurring debt with not enough money being made now two years after the CDC “guideline” was involuntarily forced upon my treatment for low back surgeries over two decades ago.I was reduced 80 effing percent in medication after 7 YEARS use without even ONE milligram increase daily and feel as if I could have continued to manage on the same dosage before reduced until I could afford to retire.The surgeon that did my back surgeries including vertebra fusion surgeries KNEW before he did my last surgery that I would be in pain for the rest of my life by telling me quote “you are going to go on SS Disability, right” My pain was manageable enough for me to stay the Owner/Operator of my small company for 23 years after surgery with the last option to manage pain KNOWN to medical science which IS opiate medication for millions of people. My families prayers and best wishes go out to the Herr family. The complacency and ZERO compassion must stop for both PEOPLE with an addiction or those of us that need adequate dosages of opiate medication to simply survive. I find it simply asinine that FAR more people die with alcohol related deaths than people that use illicit opioids and prescribed opiate medication together yet, the current administration concurs with an “opioid crisis”. The only crisis is that of pain management patients and those that have unfortunate addictions to illicit substances are still HUMAN BEINGS but are treated like “throw away” second class citizens as said before….deserving of “whatever” happens to us.IF PMP’s are not able to “adapt” to involuntarily forced. far too low dosages by now after about two years, we NEVER will be able to. DEA employees are NOT physicians and have ZERO business interfering in my health when I have been well documented as benefiting with opiate medication with doctor appointments every 8 weeks for 7 years with the current pain management specialist and 14 years with my first pain management doctor. CDC has “stated” that the 2016 new “guidelines” were supposed to be just that, a recommendation for dosages but not to be absolutely adhered to because different dosages of opiate medication is absolutely necessary because of varying factors such as metabolism of medication and weight differences just to mention a couple of reasons that ONE dosage for all medical pain management issues is asinine. Again, best wishes to the Herr family. Just a little
compassion from one human being to another CAN mean the difference between life and death. I KNOW……. as a fourteen year totally volunteer firefighter in my community when I was able to serve my fellow man.
And why are these doctors and ERs that are abandoning Chronic Pain Patients and allowing them to suffer to point of suicide, being held accountable. ITS THE SAME DAKN THING!! How about it Lawyer. You want to represent the OTHER SIDE of this Bull Shit attack on the American Citizens??!!!?
This really scares me. I am not addicted to anything but I am dependent on klonipin. If I should ever be arrested and be refused my klonip I start having simple partial seizures.
I could tell them that I was having status simple seizures but you and I know they aren’t going to believe me.