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Miami Herald

‘I can't breathe.' Man held down as EMT fatally injects wrong drug, IA suit says

The mother of an Iowa man is suing after she says her son was killed by an EMT who injected him with the wrong medicine. The federal lawsuit was filed against the City of Sioux City, the Sioux City Police Department, Sioux City Fire Rescue and several individuals. 'The City of Sioux City intends to vigorously defend against the allegations in the lawsuit and will respond specifically to the allegations by its filings with the Court. The City will not have further comment at this time,' an email from city officials to McClatchy News said. McClatchy News reached out to the Sioux City Police Department and Sioux City Fire Rescue for comment May 21 but did not immediately hear back. Just before 4 a.m. Aug. 18, 2023, Sioux City police were called for a report of a man lying in a deserted street, according to the civil complaint. Eight people from the police department and fire rescue showed up after 26-year-old James Joseph Foster Jr. told an officer he had injured his arm, the lawsuit said. Foster posed no threat and was 'instead acting disoriented and fearful of them, moving away from them repeatedly,' the complaint said. 'Paramedic Deanna LaMere decided that this was an appropriate situation for chemical restraint and that Mr. Foster needed to be injected with the powerful incapacitating drug Ketamine,' according to the lawsuit. Foster was then held down and 'against his will' LaMere injected him, the complaint said. However, it wasn't ketamine she injected him with, but instead it was a paralytic medication called rocuronium, the lawsuit said. Attorney information for LaMere was not available. Rocuronium is typically used 'with general anesthesia medicines for rapid sequence intubation and routine tracheal intubation. This medicine is also used to help relax the muscles during surgery or mechanical ventilation,' according to Mayo Clinic. After he was injected, Foster 'screamed and asked if the injection would kill him,' the lawsuit said. He told first responders he was in pain and LaMere told him, 'you're fine,' according to the complaint. At 4:10 a.m., Foster was handcuffed and he began struggling to breathe, gasping for air and asking 'am I going to die?' the lawsuit said. He then began to cry, 'I can't breathe,' as his breathing 'deteriorated almost immediately,' according to the complaint. 'Not a single on-scene Defendant checked to see if Mr. Foster was in medical distress or if he needed medical attention,' the lawsuit said. Sometime between when Foster was injected and 4:11 a.m., LaMere realized she had given him the wrong drug and 'knew that he needed immediate attention to survive,' but she didn't tell anyone, the lawsuit said. Despite his deteriorating health and obvious need for medical care, one sergeant at the scene told Foster 'You're not gonna die, you're fine,' the lawsuit said. LaMere and another officer reported that Foster began 'kicking and swinging' at first responders or 'pulled on one of the firefighter's legs with his arms,' but body cam footage 'clearly shows that this did not occur,' the complaint said. 'At 4:13 a.m., as Mr. Foster stopped all movement due to the rocuronium, and one of the on-scene Defendants then told him 'night night.' Mr. Foster's eyes remained open while he lay motionless on the stretcher,' the lawsuit said. Ultimately, Foster stopped breathing in the ambulance due to 'chemical paralysis' caused by the injected paralytic and went into cardiac arrest, the complaint said. His brain was deprived of oxygen and he died two days later, according to the lawsuit. An affidavit filed by Assistant Woodbury County Attorney Loan Hensley said LaMere realized she gave Foster the wrong medication when she went back to the ambulance to give him a 'second dose' of ketamine, the Iowa Capital Dispatch reported. But she 'did not take the appropriate actions' and 'did not take the appropriate steps to notify anyone or treat the patient any different. It wasn't until they got to the emergency room at Mercy One Medical Center that the defendant told the ER physician about the medication error,' the affidavit said, according to the outlet. She then continued her 'clumsy cover-up' by improperly disposing of the rocuronium and ketamine vials, the lawsuit said. LaMere is charged with involuntary manslaughter and pleaded not guilty on Feb. 3, the news outlet reported. In his obituary, Foster was described as a jokester and 'the daring one in crowds. ' He was a father of two girls and 'enjoyed teaching them how to build bike ramps and do backflips on their trampoline.' The lawsuit, which accuses the defendants of excessive force and medical malpractice, is asking for an undetermined amount in damages.