Let no others die from inept prison health care

February 27, 2007

Lloyd Byron Martell of Detroit died last week at 41. Prison doctors who failed to treat his colon cancer killed him, slowly and painfully. Martell's 1-to-4-year bit for fleeing a police officer turned into a death sentence, and more such cruelty will follow unless the Legislature and governor oversee Michigan's sick prison health care system.

Paroled in August, Martell knew he deserved prison. But no court condemned him to die for a stupid but minor crime. That sentence was executed by a lame, mismanaged system causing serious health problems, virtual torture and even death. Gov. Jennifer Granholm has ordered a review of prison health care, and federal courts might also extend their authority over it.

Three weeks ago, during an inspection of the soon-to-close Southern Michigan Correctional Facility in Jackson, the court's independent medical monitor found worsening medical problems, especially with physicians from Correctional Medical Services Inc., the state's contract agency for inmate health care, who routinely canceled appointments without cause. The state is preparing to move these inmates, among the system's sickest, to prisons not under federal oversight that may provide worse care.

Nothing can bring back Martell, or Timothy Joe Souders, a 21-year-old mentally ill inmate who died Aug. 6 in a hot isolation cell in Jackson. He spent most of his last four days strapped down, naked and soaked in his own urine. But the governor and legislators can help ensure that other people don't die needlessly: They can provide some oversight of the system by bringing back the Corrections Ombudsman's Office. Without it, the state will continue to expose itself to huge liabilities.

Legislators closed the Ombudsman's Office in 2003 in a move to save $500,000. The office handled thousands of complaints and resolved problems, including those that otherwise would have led to costly lawsuits. The money Geoffrey Fieger's law firm will collect on Souders' wrongful death suit would run the office for years.

Three weeks before he died, Martell also sued the Department of Corrections and CMS. Medical affidavits, filed with Detroit attorney Brian McKeen, state that Martell's cancer could have been successfully treated. It would have cost the state no more to do that; in fact, it would have cost a lot less.

Martell died with courage and gritty grace. "I'm ready to die," he told me at least 30 times. "I'm just trying to save the next man."

An auto mechanic and race car driver, Martell fought hard, drank hard and raced hard. But in suffering and dying, he found peace and deeper meaning. After his release, Martell spoke out on prison health care issues. Through the Peacemakers International mission, he ministered to homeless, addicted and afflicted people on Detroit's east side. His raspy voice was as raw as his message of change and redemption. Nothing, though, even liquid morphine, could wipe out the gut-wrenching agony that gripped his body.

Meantime, while mouthing platitudes, Michigan's leaders -- Republicans and Democrats -- have been missing in action. They've responded to the prison health care crisis with a smirk and a shrug. After "60 Minutes" recently aired a segment on Souder's death, which I had reported last August, Sen. Alan Cropsey, R-DeWitt, the former Judiciary Committee chairman, was almost obscene: "It must have been a slow news day," he said.

I hope the committee's new chairman, Sen. Wayne Kuipers, R-Holland, and other politicians show more sense. Maybe if they had known Martell and felt his agony they would do their jobs and oversee a failing system that costs taxpayers $280 million a year, and will cost them millions more in liability.

If they do, Lloyd Byron Martell, Timothy Joe Souders, Jeffrey David Clark, Anthony Mark McManus and others won't have died for nothing.

JEFF GERRITT is a Free Press editorial writer. Contact him at gerritt@freepress.com or 313-222-6585.

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