$6.4 Million Verdict After Man Dies From Untreated Alcohol Withdrawal in Kent County Jail
Won by Buckfire Law.
A federal jury awarded $6.4 million to the estate of Wade Jones, a 40-year-old man who died after jail medical staff left his acute alcohol withdrawal untreated for more than 36 hours; the Sixth Circuit upheld the verdict in August 2024.
What happened
Wade Jones was booked into Kent County Correctional Facility on April 13, 2018, after a shoplifting arrest. He was sentenced to five days. Within hours of arrival he began showing the hallmarks of acute alcohol withdrawal: hallucinations, agitation, and confusion consistent with delirium tremens.
For more than 36 hours, nursing staff employed by Corizon Health, the county's contract medical provider, documented his deteriorating condition but withheld the standard-of-care interventions. Jones was eventually moved to the facility's medical isolation unit. Less than two hours later, a deputy found him unresponsive. The oxygen tank used in the resuscitation attempt was either empty or defective. He was transferred to a hospital and placed on life support. He was pronounced brain-dead on May 2, 2018, at age 40.
His estate, represented by Jennifer Damico and Sarah Gorski of Buckfire Law, sued the county and three Corizon nurses under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983, arguing deliberate indifference to a serious medical need in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The case proceeded to trial in the Western District of Michigan.
On December 5, 2022, the jury returned a verdict of $6.4 million. The award included $3 million for Jones's pain and suffering, $400,000 for the loss of society his heirs had already sustained, and $3 million for their future loss of society. Three Corizon nurses, Melissa Furnace, Chad Richard Goetterman, and James August Mollo, were found to have acted with deliberate indifference.
Corizon filed for bankruptcy during the post-trial period, restructuring into successor entities YesCare and Tehum Care Services, which put collection of the judgment in question. The estate pursued the appeal regardless. On August 16, 2024, the Sixth Circuit affirmed the verdict in full, citing 'Jones v. Kent Cnty., 115 F.4th 504 (6th Cir. 2024).' The district court had separately added $515,500 in attorney fees and $22,000 in costs to the judgment.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.