Number of Oklahoma County jail deaths raise concerns

OKLAHOMA CITY (KOKH) — In 2016, 15 people died in the custody of the Oklahoma County Jail, so far this year 10 people have been declared dead while in the custody of the Oklahoma County Sheriff’s office. Critics of the jail say that number is too high and a FOX 25 Investigation is raising questions about what is being counted on the official list of deaths connected to the jail.

“It is important to note that a prisoner in a county jail has most of the same rights you and I have out in the world,” said Brady Henderson, the legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union of Oklahoma.

Henderson says years of mismanagement and overcrowding have created deadly conditions within the jail.

“County jails should not be places where people are dying,” Henderson told FOX 25.

Officially 10 people have died in custody in 2017. However, that number may not tell the full story.

Take the case of Drucilla Bruner. She died on July 14 from a heart attack. According to the medical examiner's report she was injured at the county jail. Bruner was there serving a few days in jail for violating the terms of her mental health court sentence.

She is not listed as an “in-custody” death. Bruner was released from custody and died in the hospital.

Her family says she had been put in a choke hold at the jail. The sheriff's office told FOX 25 she was not involved in an altercation with a jail employee.

However, court records filed after Bruner’s death show the day the medical examiner said she became injured at the jail she was accused of resisting an officer during an incident inside the jail. In fact, more than four weeks after she died the District Attorney filed a criminal felony case against her connected to that incident.

As of the publication of this story, the Oklahoma County Sheriff’s office still an active warrant for her arrest, four months after she died following the incident inside the jail.

The jail says Bruner’s medical condition was unrelated to anything that happened during her stay at the jail.

“I don't think the fault with the jail is they are failing to stop every bad thing that can happen to an inmate that is not realistic,” Henderson said. “What is realistic is learning from mistakes.”

Deaths are not the only concern. According to the jail, in 2016 there were 233 inmate-on-inmate assaults and through August of 2017 there have been 135 such incidents.

Henderson says conditions can lead to miscarriages of justice, which ultimately makes the county less safe.

“I've talked to numerous people who pled guilty to crimes they didn't commit who didn't do things they should have done in court because they wanted to get to from jail to prison because prison was that much better and that much safer for them.”

The Oklahoma County Sheriff has repeatedly denied our requests for an interview on this topic. Each time we’ve requested an interview a spokesman told us Sheriff P.D. Taylor was making changes to improve conditions.