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BROOKLYN WEEKLY, JUNE 14, 2020
Outrage over death in Sunset Park prison
Inmate suffered ‘permanent’ injuries from metal in food prior to death: lawsuit
BY ROSE ADAMS
Years before inmate Jamel
Floyd died after being pepper
sprayed inside a Sunset Park federal
prison, the 35-year-old said
he had suffered “permanent” intestinal
damage from swallowing
a paperclip in his food at a
Long Island jail — and had been
barred from fi ling a grievance report
about the incident, court records
allege.
“I had concerns about internally
bleeding because it felt like
it was ripping my insides open,”
Floyd wrote in his 2009 lawsuit,
which he fi led six months after
the incident.
Floyd had been jailed at the
Nassau County Correctional
Center prior to his trial in 2010.
Following his conviction, he began
serving out his sentence at
various prisons — including
Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention
Center, where he was incarcerated
from October 2019 until
his death on June 3.
While he was at the Long Island
detention facility, Floyd
reportedly ingested the metal
shard while eating a meal in January
of 2009, causing bleeding in
his mouth and intense abdominal
pain, according to the lawsuit.
Staffers took Floyd to the hospital
on the day of the injury, and
an x-ray showed the paper clip
fragment in his digestive tract,
according to the complaint.
Two separate x-rays conducted
in the following weeks determined
the metal was no longer
in his body, according to the
court documents — but Floyd
said he continued to feel pain in
his abdomen for months after the
incident.
“As a result of the defendants
callous indifference, plaintiff has
been permanently damaged.
His stomach cramps up alot and
every now and then there is spotted
blood when ever he use the
bathroom sic,” wrote Floyd in
the complaint.
Floyd also alleged that the
jail denied him adequate medical
care and that its food services
system — which employs inmates
to prepare food — doesn’t include
enough professional oversight,
putting other inmates in danger.
He sought $5 million in damages.
After the incident, Floyd said
he had attempted to fi le a grievance
report within the fi ve-day
window required before inmates
can take legal action —
but claimed his attempts were
“denied,” and that he was held
in a “dry cell” that banned outside
materials in the week following
the incident, preventing him
from fi ling any report, according
to the court order.
Still, a judge claimed that Floyd
“failed to exhaust his claims pursuant
to the available administrative
remedy” and dismissed
the case, agreeing with the defendants’
argument that the incident
was a “mistake,” rather than evidence
of unconstitutional practices
at the jail. An appeal of the
case in 2011 was also dismissed.
The case came more than 10
years before corrections offi cers
used mace in an attempt to restrain
Floyd, who became “disruptive”
and “potentially harmful
to himself and others” inside
his cell at Sunset Park’s Metropolitan
Detention Center on June 3,
according to the Federal Bureau
of Prisons.
“Responding staff observed
inmate Jamel Floyd barricaded
inside his cell and breaking the
cell door window with a metal object,”
the Bureau of Prisons said
in a statement on June 3. “Pepper
spray was deployed and staff removed
him from his cell.”
Floyd became unconscious,
and medics transported him to
a nearby hospital, where he was
pronounced dead, according to
the statement.
Floyd’s mother, Donna Mays,
told the Daily News that her son
was asthmatic, making pepper
spray potentially life-threatening.
His death sparked outrage
from local politicians and activists,
who demonstrated outside
the facility on June 4 as part of
nationwide protests against law
enforcement that have swept the
city since May 28.
During that demonstration,
Mays blasted the corrections offi -
cers for using the chemical agent
against her son.
“They murdered him,” said
the distraught mother.
Jamel Floyd, an inmate at the Metropolitan Detention Center, died on June 3 after
being maced by staffers. Photo by Paul Frangipane
Driver critically injures 10-year-old girl in Canarsie
An SUV driver struck a 10-yearold
girl in Canarsie on June 7, critically
injuring her, police said.
A female driver struck the girl,
whom police have not identifi ed, at
about 1:50 pm on June 7 while heading
northbound on Remsen Avenue
by Avenue L. Police from the
69th Precinct said it appeared that
the girl was crossing the street in
the crosswalk when she was hit.
First responders rushed the
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BY TODD MAISEL
girl to Brookdale University Medical
Center in critical condition
with severe trauma injuries.
Police on the scene tested the
driver for intoxication but have not
deemed the incident criminal and
have made no arrests.
A witness said that the driver
appeared to be speeding.
“She was laying there motionless
— the lady was fl ying down
Remsen Avenue,” said Roger
Clark, who lives nearby. “She was
in rough shape.”
Another resident agreed, adding
that the drivers typically speed
on the avenue.
“These people fl y up and down
Remsen Avenue with very little
regard for human life. She looked
like she was in a rush and crushed
the girl,” said Shane Messler, another
local.
The crash is under investigation
by the NYPD’s Collision Investigation
Squad.
Cops investigate at the scene near the intersection of Remsen Avenue and Avenue
L. Photo by Lloyd Mitchell