Lawsuit Alleges Jail Cell Door Left Open By Guards, Inmate Attacked While Sleeping.
BY: STAFF REPORT | BocaNewsNow.com
BOCA RATON, FL (BocaNewsNow.com) (Copyright © 2021 MetroDesk Media, LLC) — Boca Raton-based Geo Group, which runs private prisons and lockup facilities, is facing a lawsuit after an inmate was allegedly beaten at a facility in Palm Beach County.
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Roque Calafell says he was an inmate at the South Bay Correctional Facility in Palm Beach County when guards inexplicably — and apparently violating policy — left the door to his two person cell open at night. While Calafell slept, another inmate entered the cell and violently attacked Calafell, stabbing him.
From the suit:
“On or about September 16, 2020, Plaintiff was an inmate in the South Bay Correctional Facility in the care, custody and control of GEO Group, and was housed in cell 209 of Quad 2 of Dorm C. 7. At that time and place, at approximately in the morning while the Plaintiff was asleep in his two man secure cell, his cell door left open by GEO Group staff, and another inmate was allowed to leave his cell and enter Plaintiff’s cell, who then proceeded to violently attack the Plaintiff. As a result of the attack, Plaintiff was stabbed in the face and neck areas and sustained serious bodily injuries.”
The suit also alleges:
“This duty of care required GEO Group to maintain the premises at the South Bay Correctional Facility in a reasonably safe condition to prevent attacks on inmates by other inmates that are reasonably foreseeable, and to act reasonably or otherwise placing inmates in an unsafe and vulnerable position rendering them defenseless from attacks from other inmates. It is known in the corrections industry generally and to GEO Group specifically, that inmates assigned to secure cells must main locked inside their secure cell overnight because it poses an unreasonable risk of harm allow these inmates to move about the facility freely at night when other inmates are sleeping, because an inmate can leave his cell and enter another inmate’s cell while the other inmate is sleeping, and perpetrate an attack on the other inmate while he is in a vulnerable and defenseless position.”
Geo Group, based on Technology Way in Boca Raton, operates 58 facilities nationwide with 73,942 beds.
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