Diabetic Dies in Jail After Police Refuse to Give Him Insulin

[eridani]

http://www.nationofchange.org/2015/08/20/diabetic-dies-in-jail-after-police-refuse-to-give-him-insulin/

A diabetic man died in police custody this weekend after deputies reportedly left him in solitary confinement while refusing to provide his insulin medication. Accusing the police of causing his death, the victim’s family has called for an investigation into why he was denied his medically required injections. Although many people continue to die in police custody, officers are rarely face any criminal charges for causing their deaths or allowing them to die.

On the morning of August 14, Kennett police officers arrested 33-year-old Michael Robinson on a warrant for unpaid child support. After arriving at the Pemiscot County Jail in Missouri, Robinson reportedly told the officers that he was a diabetic and begged them for insulin. Instead of administering his medically necessary injections, the guards threw Robinson in solitary confinement to silence him.

According to his family, Robinson’s diabetes required him to take shots of insulin twice a day. Recently on Facebook, Robinson’s cousin, Brigette “Brig” Robinson posted a comment from his sister saying, “Brig I just heard that my brother was asking the jailers that he needed to go to the hospital and he was yelling and begging. They put him in the hole to keep him quiet. They didn’t get him out again until his girlfriend came to visit. So sad, I’m hurting.”

Pemiscot County sheriff’s deputies allegedly refused to give Robinson medical treatment until he became too weak to hold up his own head. Robinson was eventually transferred to a hospital where his blood sugar level was monitored at 2,500. According to the American Diabetes Association, the normal range is between 80 and 180 depending on the time between meals.

Robinson was pronounced dead early on Sunday evening. In response to accusations that his deputies were responsible for Robinson’s death, Pemiscot County Sheriff Tommy Greenwell announced that the Missouri State Police has launched an investigation into the treatment Robinson received while in jail.

[yuiyoshida]

1. So many have died recently, while in

Police Custody, is this how police departments are supposed to function? We are no better than a third world country, at this point.

[malaise]

2. Missouri state will now pay that child support

This is murder most foul and I hope the family sue them big time.

[TexasProgresive]

3. Murder most foul

You said it.

[ladjf]

4. The beat down goes on unabatted. nt

[joshcryer]

5. Cops aren't trained to provide aid.

It's because if the person gets out of their custody they lose control. So there are a lot of instances where people say they need medical attention and the cops shrug it off as a fake attempt to get out of their custody.

Think about it this way. A cop is in the middle of their shift. They arrest someone who claims that they need medical attention. If they call an ambulance the hospital visit is a good 6 hours minimum. Their report would consist of "I arrived at the scene, and the alleged criminal asked for medical treatment, treatment was provided and the case was handed off to Jones."

Instead it goes like this, "I arrived at the scene, subject appeared in good health, but asked for medical treatment which was deemed unnecessary. Subject writhed in the back of the car, as I grilled him about the crime he allegedly committed. Subject admitted that he stole the bike. Subject was released to the jail."

See how the cop loses his power and control over the arrestee? This shit needs to change. Arresting people, getting people caught up in gotchas, and lying to the public. It has to stop. There has to be strong repercussions for this crap. A good chunk of our police force needs to be fired.

[gvstn]

17. Truth.

A very good characterization of what has become bad policing. Protect and Serve has become Arrest someone at any cost. Cops are supposed to protect the peace not just arrest people. The British seem to have this down to some extent although there are abuses.

[joshcryer]

18. You put it better than me.

"Protect and Serve has become Arrest someone at any cost."

Literally their job description at this point. Watch an episode of COPS and it's damn obvious.

[Gothmog]

6. This is criminal

[Lee-Lee]

7. No possible excuse for this

Once someone is in your custody you are responsible for them. Sure lots of people will fake illness, but you have to deal with it.

If someone claimed blood sugar issues with me I just got on the radio and had an ambulance come check and give treatment. Sure, 95% of the time it was drunks or drug users who thought the could beat an intox/DUI by claiming to be diabetic, but that's just another hassle of the job.

In the jail? No excuse for it. Have EMS come check them out when they claim s problem. It's what's right for the prisoner and it covers your ass.

Depending on Missouri law at a minimum manslaughter, possibly murder but I'm not familiar enough with the nuances of that states laws. For the shift supervisor and whatever jailer tossed them in.

And the jai needs to lose it certification and start over from the ground up before reopening. Let them pay other counties to house their inmates and deal with the transportation hassles for a while.

In most states the qualifications to be a jailer, and training, are far lower than to be a cop. That should change too.

[gvstn]

15. Thanks for this informative post.

[joshcryer]

19. Glad you put up with the hassle.

It alarms me that there are some out there who act as if it's "simply" a hassle, and this sort of thing happens.

You're a good person in my eyes. And while I might have said that a lot of cops need to be fired I wouldn't consider you or anyone like you one of them.

[Lee-Lee]

23. It's very easy to get jaded on the job

Around something like the constant lies about medical problems among all the rest.

Half the people you put cuffs on swear your damaging their arms or wrists. People fake diabetic problems, seizures, deafness.... You name it, if they think they can somehow get out of or delay getting arrested I've seen it tried. They will fake pain hoping to go to the ER and get one last fix before jail.

I never cared about them wasting my time- my shift was 12 hours no matter what and if their antics led into overtime that's money in the bank. It's easier to babysit some douchebag in the ER for a few hours and flirt with the doctors than go respond to domestic disputes, robberies and other calls. I did care that when I worked patrol we only have 5 deputies to cover over 500 square miles (and when you factored in vacations, sick leave, training, court dates more often than not it was 4 unless we could get a part timer to come in) and they were keeping me from doing actual work to help someone who might need it and causing everyone else on my shift to work harder. And it bothered me most, and the ambulance crews, that we had to tie up one of only 4 ambulances in the county for their crap- that meant that someone with a real emergency might be waiting anywhere from 5-15 minutes longer for the ambulance from another district to come. With a heart attack or stroke that extra response time caused by someone faking can be life or death.

But, it's just what it is. You can't let it cause you to get careless and have to watch yourself for signs of getting jaded. When all you do for 12 hours at a time is run from call to call of crappy person after crappy person doing bad things it's dammed easy to let that skew your worldview of how most people really are. One thing they all warned us about when I was going trough BLET is don't become one of those people who only hangs out with cops off duty because then your view of the world can easily get skewed- if your only seeing the dregs of humanity (or the effect of what they did to good people) at work and just hanging out with cops off work your worldview becomes "cops good rest of world bad".

That's one reason real community policing is important. It doesn't just get cops out interacting with the citizens outside of calls for service to show citizens that cops are not all bad and just there when you are in trouble- it also serves to remind cops who would otherwise just deal with scumbags hour after hour that there are a majority of people who they don't get called to deal with who are good honest folks.

[truegrit44]

20. Agree to this..........

I worked for a small county jail in CO for 9 years. They were very careful about medications. One question asked when being booked was if they were on any meds. Diabetics were given top priority especially if on insulin shots. Diabetics on insulin usually give their own injections all the jailer need do is supervise.

NO excuse for this, I hope the jail is shut down! Not to mention I live in MO now

[IDemo]

8. Using an 18 Cent test strip, they could have verified that in seconds

[mountain grammy]

9. The man was given a death sentence for non payment of child support..

sounds like America to me. Legal lynchings happen daily in the American justice system.

If this were an isolated case, that'd be one thing, but it's far from isolated..


http://www.vice.com/read/how-many-people-die-in-police-custody-in-america-265

[tblue37]

12. And Raw Story has an article up now about an unarmed man shot to death by a cop who

recognized him as having a warrant out for a probation violation and missing a drug counseling session.

Everything seems worth a death sentence to the LEOs and jailers now.

[MiniMe]

10. The police can't give the shot

But diabetics can do it themselves. This is criminal neglect

[awoke_in_2003]

11. He was black- how surprising...

NOT. Fucking cops.

[PowerToThePeople]

13. Uh, that was murder

the cops involved should be on death row after this is done.

[jmowreader]

14. 2500 isn't "blood sugar," it's corn syrup dyed red

I see massive and justified lawsuits coming Pemiscot County's way.

[gvstn]

16. 2500 isn't even on the scale.

My mom had a heart attack and the EMT guys said her reading was something like 480 and their monitor only went that high. They called it off the scale. How you could have a 2500 is beyond belief.

[eridani]

21. Indeed. I'm on insulin myself and could hardly believe that number

More like having blood in your syrup.

[Quackers]

22. Interesting info here

http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/world-records/highest-blood-sugar-level/