Starr County has denied allegations made in a wrongful death lawsuit by the parents of a 32-year-old man who took his own life inside the county jail.
Edgar Garza’s parents, Maria and Ezequiel Garza, filed a lawsuit against Starr County after their son died by suicide in the jail on Oct. 18, 2020.
Edgar had been transferred from the Hidalgo County Adult Detention Center to the Starr County jail due to overcrowding.
In the response, which was filed Tuesday, Starr County generally denied the allegations and claimed it is exempt from the petition because of governmental and sovereign immunity.
Garza’s parents allege that Starr County has shown a pattern of neglecting inmates who are at risk of suicide by not properly screening inmates, adequately monitoring video cameras nor doing cell checks when required by accordance to the Texas Commission on Jail Standards, according to the lawsuit.
The alleged pattern refers to two other deaths that occurred at the Starr County jail, one in 2018 and another less than two months before Edgar’s.
The lawsuit states that the Starr County jail failed to monitor an “Alberto Pena, despite the cell being set up with live video footage, who was in need of medical attention while in a solitary cell, resulting in his death.”
Pena was found unresponsive in a restraint system designed to protect people and personnel by reducing the possibility of injury and death on Aug. 13, 2020.
An inspection report by the Texas Commission on Jail Standards performed on Sept. 25, 2020, states that face-to-face observations weren’t conducted within 15 minutes, which was required at the time, on Pena, according to the petition.
On May 13, 2018, in the same cell Pena would eventually die in, Marco Munoz was able to asphyxiate himself using clothing despite the cell’s camera being pointed at him.
The inspection report conducted at the end of May following Munoz’s suicide states that “it was determined that the 30-minute, face-to-face observations of inmates in areas where inmates are known to be assaultive, potentially suicidal, mentally ill, or who have demonstrated bizarre behavior are confined were not conducted in accordance with Minimum Jail Standards.”
The lawsuit states that the deaths of Munoz and Pena could’ve been prevented by adequately monitoring their cells and providing appropriate aid, which were areas Starr County Sheriff Rene Fuentes refused to implement remedial policy change following Munoz’s suicide, according to the petition.
Fuentes was the Sheriff of Starr County in 2018 and 2020 and is the final policymaker in the area of law enforcement, the lawsuit reads.
He had been placed on notice twice following the deaths of Munoz and Pena yet failed to implement policies ensuring the safety of inmates as required by the Texas Commission on Jail Standards, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit alleges that the jail failed to adequately monitor inmates that came back as matches for mental health treatment during state-mandated Continuity of Care Queries, which resulted in the death of Edgar as he showed up as a probable match for mental health treatment, yet wasn’t placed in a padded observation cell free of tie-off points.
He also wasn’t searched for ligatures before being housed, the lawsuit stated.
A jailer conducted a face-to-face check on the holding cell housing Edgar at 11:15 p.m. and it wasn’t until 11:59 p.m. that another jailer noticed Edgar’s feet through the bottom of the restroom partition after he had hung himself, according to the document.
Edgar removed his pants revealing basketball shorts underneath, which held a drawstring he used to tie a noose and used the restroom stalls’ metal partition support beam to hang himself — all captured on video.
“No one from the Starr County jail stopped him from tying a noose to the partition support beam despite this being done on video just as Mr. Munoz was able to prepare and commit to suicide despite there being video footage for jailers to monitor,” the lawsuit alleges.
As of Thursday afternoon, an initial hearing in the case has not been scheduled, court records indicate.
