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| Suit in prison death amended |
| By Associated Press |
| Published: 11/17/2003 |
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A family suing over the death of a Bucks County, Pa. prison inmate altered the lawsuit yesterday to include a theory that her brain hemorrhage was caused by a decongestant that was pulled from shelves because of fears it caused strokes. Virginia Brejcak, 42, suffered a seizure in her cell on Christmas Day in 2001 and died the next day at a hospital. Her family sued in U.S. District Court in Philadelphia in August, contending that Bucks County prison officials ignored Brejcak's complaints that she was suffering from seizures, headaches, and a drug-resistant bacteria that has since sickened dozens of other inmates. In their amended suit, Brejcak's relatives further blamed her death on a cold medication prescribed by prison doctors about a month before her death. According to the lawsuit, the drug contained phenylpropanolamine, which was widely used in appetite suppressants and cold medicines until 2000, when studies linked it to a slightly increased risk of hemorrhagic stroke in young women. Lawyers for the family said two doctors who cared for Brejcak and the pharmacy that provided the drugs should have heeded the Food and Drug Administration's year-old warning that drugs with phenylpropanolamine should no longer be sold. County officials had previously said that there was no evidence that Brejcak's death was caused by methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus, a hard-to-treat and occasionally dangerous bacteria that can give its victims abscesses and boils. Since Brejcak's death, jail officials have been struggling to stamp out the infection. Several current and former inmates and officers have also sued, claiming officials did not do enough to halt its spread. Brejcak, of Fairless Hills, who had a history of seizures that predated her time in prison, had been serving a short jail term for a probation violation. |
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