Lawsuit: Tippecanoe jail, medical officials ignored dying inmate

Yahoo

09-07-2025

LAFAYETTE, IN — The son of a Delphi man who died last year after spending nearly a week in the Tippecanoe County Jail has filed a civil rights lawsuit in federal court against Sheriff Bob Goldsmith, several jail employees, and employees of the company the jail hires to provide medical care to inmates.
The lawsuit alleges deliberate indifference to 38-year-old Troy Dean Pownell, in violation of his Eighth Amendment rights against cruel and unusual punishment, in describing how Pownell was treated as he and cell mates tried repeatedly to rouse help for the man's "severe and unrelenting abdominal pain for two days."
Pownell, who court records show had a history of low-felony substance abuse- and theft-related cases, had been arrested on a warrant on April 2, 2024, after missing a court date.
"Although he battled drug addiction, Troy entered the jail in good health," attorneys wrote in a news release. "Four days later, Troy began to experience abdominal pain. By the early morning hours of April 8th, his abdominal pain was excruciating."
In addition to Goldsmith, the lawsuit names as defendants Jail Commander Thomas Lehman; Assistant Jail Commander Carrie Morgan; and jail officers Bailey Clark, Makenzie Cheever and Cole Zimmer.
Quality Correctional Care is an Indiana-based company that contracts for inmate health services in 65 of the state's 92 counties, according to its website. It, too, is a defendant in the lawsuit, along with two of the company's licensed practical nurses, Monica Flores and Briana Frazier.
Pownell's son, Troy Allen Pownell, was named special administrator of his father's estate and is the plaintiff.
"I miss my dad every day and just wish they would have helped him when it was so obvious that he needed to go to the hospital," the younger Pownell said in a statement. "We hope this case helps change how people with medical problems are treated when they are in jail."
The lawsuit alleges the following facts:
When Pownell was booked into the jail, two initial medical assessments found no concerns or symptoms, and he did not appear to be under the influence of drugs or alcohol.
Later in the day on April 3, he began to feel ill. For two days, Pownell began to feel worse and spent most of his time on the mattress on the floor of his cell, according to video.
By the afternoon of April 6, he was moved after he began to feel worse, dry heaving and with stomach pain. He spent all day the next day in his cell and complaining about severe abdominal pain.
Although Pownell had told nurse Flores shortly after arrival that he had used heroin, the lawsuit quotes the World Health Organization as saying opioid withdrawal would have begun eight to 24 hours after use; Pownell's symptoms did not peak until April 8, nearly six days after he entered the jail.
Pownell and his cell mates reportedly attempted to alert nurses and jail officers repeatedly, including banging on the cell door and his "begging to go to the hospital," but they were ignored or quickly dismissed.
Flores "wrote off Troy's symptoms as 'faking' something serious" and merely gave him electrolytes. By then, according to the lawsuit, the man had to lean on the wall, the bunk beds or the small table in the cell. He was spending his time, according to records and videos, vomiting and spitting mucus, which was occasionally tinged with blood.
One of his inmates said Pownell "couldn't move" and "looked like a frail old man." Flores noted that his hands were cold and clammy.
The nurse told Pownell, "'You're not getting a free ride to the hospital today' and something to the like of 'Since you're just going to continue to f--- around, we (the nurses) are just going to leave (you here),'" according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit accuses "several" jail employees of slandering Pownell by calling him a faker and other profane names. The hostility was an "unconstitutional and widespread practice," the lawsuit said.
Pownell told one of his cell mates that he thought he was dying, the lawsuit said.
About 7:30 p.m. on April 8, Pownell began to convulse. Four minutes later, nurse Frazier and two jail officers responded to the cell mate's pleading for help. "Troy was cold to the touch and had no pulse by this time," the lawsuit said.
Medics took Pownell to a hospital, where a physician noted he had suffered cardiac arrest, acute respiratory failure and required endotracheal intubation. The coroner said the cause of death was sepsis due to a perforated duodenal ulcer, with cirrhosis of the liver contributing.
The lawsuit asks for damages for wrongful death, including funeral, burial and attorney costs.
The Tippecanoe County Jail and Quality Correctional Care — and their employees — are named in another active case in the federal court system involving an inmate's death, this one involving the suicide of an inmate in December 2021.
In that case, filed in May 2023, the plaintiff alleges that 25-year-old Calvin Miller had reported depression and mental health issues to correctional officers and medical providers in the months he had spent there. The lawsuit says he had written messages on his cell walls, such as "depressed," that were ignored.
Miller, who was jailed in September 2021 on a warrant, had a Tippecanoe County history of meth possession and auto theft.
The defendants have generally denied the allegations and filed a motion to dismiss in November that has not yet been decided.
This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: Lawsuit: Tippecanoe County jail, medical officials ignored dying inmate