Wrongful death suit settled, leads to medical improvements at Teton County Jail
Wrongful death suit settled, leads to medical improvements at Teton County Jail
By Emily Mieure
Jackson Hole News&Guide
Via Wyoming News Exchange
JACKSON – After years of litigation the family of Scott Millward hopes the inmates at the Teton County Jail are getting adequate medical care — something they said Millward didn’t get when he died in his jail cell.
The Millwards received $377,500 in a recent settlement with Teton County, according to their attorney Skip Jacobson. Millward’s death and subsequent lawsuit also resulted in a new medical contractor that puts nurses at the jail full-time, rather than just a few times per week.
After Millward died in custody in 2015, his family sued the Teton County Board of County Commissioners, former Teton County Sheriff Jim Whalen, employees of the Teton County Jail, the jail’s former medical contractor Correct Care Solutions LLC and its nurses.
It resulted in two separate settlements, one with the Teton County defendants and another with the contracted medical staff.
“Our family wanted justice for Scott,” his brother Steven Millward said in a statement to the News&Guide. “Although the burden of his loss and the circumstances surrounding it will be carried forever by those who knew and loved him, it is our profound hope the conditions that befell Scott are now corrected and under a microscope of scrutiny worthy [of] his memory.”
Scott Millward, 47, was in the custody of the Teton County Sheriff’s Office when he died July 16, 2015, after being arrested on a DUI charge a few days before.
Millward, the son of former Teton County Sheriff Roger Millward, was arrested July 13, 2015, after a state trooper pulled him over for going 37 mph in a 55 mph zone.
The wrongful death complaint said Millward was “detained and placed in a holding cell while in hypertensive crisis and undergoing alcohol detoxification.”
The complaint claims jail employees “ignored and were deliberately indifferent” to Millward’s medical needs.
Millward agreed to a breath test when he was booked into jail, which resulted in a .319 blood alcohol reading. According to the complaint he then told jail staff about his hypertension and diabetes. A jail employee reportedly called a nurse at home to tell her about Millward’s “dangerously high” breath test result.
The nurse ordered staff to take his blood pressure, which was 197 over 141. The complaint said the nurse instructed a detention officer over the phone to give Millward a single dose of Clonidine.
Millward reportedly refused the medication, but the nurse wasn’t notified.
A nurse met with Millward, who would be dead less than 48 hours later, the next day, July 14, at 11:30 a.m. and noted he was experiencing severe tremors, agitation and anxiety.
Millward appeared before Judge James Radda on July 15 for a preliminary hearing in his DUI. During the hearing Radda said Millward didn’t look well and ordered an alcohol assessment.
The complaint states 18 informal head counts were done improperly the night before and the morning of Millward’s death.
An internal investigation later showed jail staff didn’t follow proper medical protocols, which led to immediate policy changes at the detention center like assigning a designated officer to each shift and a backup officer to be responsible for issuing medications.
That policy is outdated, though, because in 2016 the Teton County Jail cut ties with Correct Care Solutions LLC and hired Dr. Kennon Tubbs to provide inmate medical care.
Reached by phone Tuesday, Tubbs said three nurses cover the Teton County Jail full-time, 60 hours a week. Now the nurses — not detention officers —administer medications to inmates.
“We are striving to do a really good job at having patients who are in withdrawal evaluated on a frequent basis and having their medications provided by nurses,” Tubbs said, “not giving officers any medical responsibilities.”
At the time of Millward’s death the official cause of death was listed as a preexisting heart condition. But a pathologist added an addendum to the report in 2018 after receiving Millward’s full medical records during a deposition, information the Millward family attorney said Teton County should have provided initially.
“Considering the comorbidities and the hypertensive urgency it is my opinion to a reasonable medical certainty, that these factors, predominantly the hypertension, were contributing factors in the cardiovascular event resulting in the death of Mr. Millward,” wrote Forensic Pathologist Charles Garrison.
Reached by text Tuesday afternoon former Teton County Sheriff Jim Whalen, who retired in 2018, said the lawsuit was a learning experience for him.
“I learned that after people are booked for committing crimes, jails are then used as detox centers, mental health holding facilities and, in some ways, triage centers for the people in need of medical care; all of which should be changed,” he said. “But my positive takeaway was realizing how totally dedicated the people who work in the jail are to fulfilling their commitment to the care and custody of the inmates. The people of Teton County can feel assured they have very committed and compassionate people working in their jail.”
The jail’s policy book, provided to the News&Guide by Teton County Sheriff’s Lt. Chett Hooper, says informal head counts of inmates are done twice hourly in all occupied cell blocks.
“The floor officer shall observe conditions of the inmates’ physical and mental well-being,” the policy states.
The last jail officer to see Millward alive described asking him how he was doing and receiving “a curt, ‘Fine,’” the internal investigation report states.
The jail’s security cameras were the only witnesses after that.
At around 11:30 p.m. July 15 Millward pulled his blanket up and rolled over. The cameras document no further movement from Millward during the night.
He was discovered dead the next morning around 7:30, according to the report.
“There is no seizing or other unusual movements seen,” Sgt. Todd Stanyon, who conducted the internal investigation, wrote. “In fact, it appears that Millward simply rolled over and went to sleep.”
Jacobson, the Millward’s attorney, said “Scott was held in a holding cell the size of a closet for over 55 hours and had two separate medical emergencies. In those 55 hours he was never seen by a physician.”
Dr. Tubbs said Teton County now commits the money needed to have full-time nurses at the jail. Tubbs, who is based in Utah, said he makes quarterly visits to the Teton County Jail.
If inmates are having an emergency, they’re to be taken to the emergency department at St. John’s Health.
Tubbs provides medical oversight in Lincoln County too, and said that jail — like many county jails in the country — doesn’t have the funds to have an in-house nurse.
“You have to work with what you have,” he said. “We try to provide great medical care either way.”
Jacobson, on behalf of the Millward family, said they hoped Scott Millward’s death and the wrongful death lawsuit will serve as a reminder that full-time medical care at correctional facilities is worth paying for.
“They have a constitutional responsibility to provide reasonable and necessary medical care and attention,” Jacobson said. “We hope this lawsuit helps bring that home to the county commissioners.”
Attorneys for the various Teton County defendants and for Correct Care Solutions LLC did not return calls or emails by press time.