MINNEAPOLIS –The family of a man who died while in custody at the Hennepin County Jail has won a $3.4 million settlement from the county. Lucas Bellamy Bellamy, although critically ill and in great pain, was left to “crawl around on the jail floor like he was subhuman, like he was an animal,” the family said. The death was in 2022. The settlement is believed to be one of the largest in Minnesota history for a jail death. According to settlement terms revealed in court document, this is what happened:
> Bellamy, age 41, was arrested and told jailers that he had just ingested a bag of drugs and asked for a Narcan antidote, which he was not given.
>Later Bellamu was taken to Hennepin County Medical Center for a screening and found clinically stable but that he should be brought back to the emergency room for any new symptoms.
> A doctor prescribed Bellamy an array of mild over-the-counter drugs but nothing for potential opioid withdrawals.
> Two days later Belllamy became ill and started vomiting in his cell.
> By the evening, he was doubled over in pain and screaming for help. “My stomach hurts really bad,” he said. He was left unattended to “crawl around on the jail floor like he was subhuman, like he was an animal, while he slowly and painfully died from the effects of a hole in his intestine,” the family said.
> Jailers never took Bellamy back to the hospital.
> Whioe he was exhibiting these symtoms, a jail nurse did not examine his abdomen but told him to alert jailers if his condition progressed.
> While taking his vitals, this nurse failed to take his temperature, which, according the family, would have shown dire straits.
> A second nurs visited Bellamy’s cell the next morning and found him too weak to ingest the over-the-counter drugs he had been prescribed.
> This nurse, the lawsuit alleges, chit-chatted with a deputy on other matters as Bellamy crawled on the floor in pain.
> Bellamy was pronounced dead that afternoon.
The lawsuit alleged that four county employees overseeing Bellamy violated his constitutional rights and acted with “deliberate indifference.”
Writhing, crawling, dying. Among images that Hennepin County didn’t want you to see.
Bellamy. College at Landmark College in Vermont. Son of Penumbra Theater founder in St. Paul and performed from time to time. Drug addiction was a demon he fought.
Jail conditions
The Minnesota Department of Corrections has ordered Hennepin County Sheriff Dawanna Witt to reduce its jail population immediately from 900 inmates to 600 due to overcrowding and safety concerns. The order said the jail had “failed to conduct timely well-being checks” connected, in part, to the deaths of seven inmates in he past two years. Witt declined to comment on the order except she said she would appeal.