A federal judge has refused to dismiss a suit filed by a former prison medical technician who was beaten by an inmate.  Myrn Ann Stebner was conducting a routine blood draw in an infirmary at Utah State Prison in September when she was cornered by Randall W. Jackson, 36, an inmate with a long history of sex crimes, including a prior conviction for raping a halfway-house counselor.
Officers heard the scream but could not intervene in time, the report indicated. Jackson, who is serving a term of 15 years to life, was apprehended by the officers outside the infirmary.
Stebner was treated for a broken nose, bruises to the face and swelling.
'[The Utah Department of Corrections] knowingly put Jackson, a convicted kidnapper and rapist, in a closed room alone with Stebner, without handcuffing or shackling Jackson and without providing Stebner any training on self-preservation,' wrote U.S. District Judge Tena
Campbell. '[Corrections officials'] acts put Stebner at a substantial risk of serious immediate and proximate harm . . . there is little doubt but that the risk of harm to Stebner was known and obvious.'
But the state's attorneys do not agree.
In court briefs, the attorneys argued the attack on Stebner was not sufficiently 'egregious' to merit a hearing before a jury. And even if the beating was serious enough to 'shock the conscience of the court,' state Corrections officials did not necessarily know 'they were constitutionally required to provide [Stebner] with a security officer during the performance of her duties.'
Stebner, 56, claims she is suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, depression, sleeplessness and panic attacks. She is seeking a change in prison policy and damages to be determined at trial.
Kathryn Collard, Stebner's attorney, said many prison workers are afraid.
Indeed, the beating exposed fears about staff security at Utah State
Prison and raised new complaints about a policy that excludes some clinical employees from police training.
'We are outraged by the attack by an inmate with a history of sexual assaults and violence against female staff,' two Diagnostic Unit psychologists wrote in a memo obtained last year by The Salt Lake Tribune. 'A certain portion of our outrage is directed toward the administrative staff within the department who have continued to ignore our request for proper training so an attack like this would not take place or the injuries could be minimized.'