A federal jury has awarded $549,000 to a Washington state inmate with multiple sclerosis who was repeatedly denied non-addictive nerve-pain medication by prison staff.
The Seattle Times reports the jury in Tacoma last week found that three prison medical staffers showed "deliberate indifference" to Etienne Choquette's pain and medical needs when they refused to allow him medication that was prescribed to him by a neurologist.
Choquette was awarded $149,000 in compensatory damages for violation of his Eighth Amendment rights and $400,000 in punitive damages. (Tacoma News Tribune, November 8, 2018)
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Although WA DOC has not publicly commented on this ruling; it is difficult to understand why prison medical staff would deny prescribed medication to an inmate.
It seems however that disregard for the health and welfare of inmates may be common in other facilities as well, as we saw in these reports:
Army Veteran Mocked and Left to Die By Clackamas County Sheriff’s Deputies
Inmates Denied Medical Attention After Being Pepper Sprayed in Prison
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