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| Inmate's Open Shunt Led to Bleeding Death |
| By Los Angeles Times |
| Published: 02/16/2004 |
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An autopsy of a Corcoran State Prison inmate who bled to death in his cell overnight on Super Bowl Sunday showed that his medical shunt was not fully closed, allowing blood to flow out of his jugular vein, authorities said. The autopsy Feb. 5 could not determine whether inmate Ronald Herrera, a 58-year-old dialysis patient, had opened the shunt's clamp in a fit of anger, or if the medical staff responding to his screams administered a sedative through the shunt and had failed to close the device. "That is one of the questions investigators will look at," said Rene Hanavan, chief deputy coroner for Kings County (Calif.). "The bleeding from the open dialysis shunt caused him to go into shock, and that shock caused his heart to beat in an irregular rhythm." On Feb. 6, state Sen. Gloria Romero (D-Los Angeles), who recently co-chaired a series of legislative hearings critical of the prison system, called on Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer to take over the investigation into what she called a "gruesome and completely avoidable" death. Officers could be found criminally negligent if they were too busy watching the Super Bowl game to respond to Herrera's repeated screams. Romero questioned whether Kings County Dist. Atty. Ron Calhoun, who was elected in 1998 on the strength of financial backing from the state prison officers' union, could conduct an independent probe of the local prison. A press spokesman for the attorney general said Romero's letter had not crossed Lockyer's desk, but "when it does, we'll review it." Patrick Hart, Kings County's chief deputy prosecutor, said a story on Herrera's death in The Times on Feb. 5 has complicated the investigation. He said correctional officers at Corcoran might use the story to claim facts about the incident that they did not observe. Hart would not give further details of the investigation. |
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