Date: Mon, 16 May 2005 19:20:40 -0000
From: "Ed Kramer Legal Defense" <administrator@edkramer.org>
Subject: Deliberate Indifference by Gwinnett County and PHS in Supreme Court Appeal
Deliberate Indifference by Gwinnett County and Prison Health
Services, Inc. in Supreme Court Appeal
GEORGIA, May 16 - A Civil Rights Action brought against Gwinnett
County and Prison Heath Services, Inc. (PHS), et.al., for their
deliberate indifference to a Georgia man's serious medical needs,
has now been presented for consideration to the United States
Supreme Court. Several organizations are preparing to enter Amicus
Briefs in support of granting Certiorari. An on-line copy of the
appeal is available at
http://members.aol.com/defensefund/petition.htm
Gwinnett County resident, Edward Kramer, was arrested in August,
2000 and held at the Gwinnett County Detention Center (GCDC), a
county jail that contracts with PHS for all their medical needs.
Kramer's complete, verified, voluminous jail records from his five
months of detainment show that PHS failed to provide him with
minimally prescribed medications and tests, adequate and timely
treatments for acute medical needs, and access to appropriate
medical interventions for his worsening conditions. "Incarceration
before or after trial is not grounds for denying the vital health
treatment to which every citizen is entitled," states attorney
Robert A. Hirschfeld, who drafted the appeal.
The Gwinnett County Detention Center (GCDC) was opened in 1991 and
was originally designed for a total of 516 inmates; on May 8, 2005,
there were 2,100 inmates crammed into the facility. Most recently,
the video-captured death of GCDC detainee Frederick Williams has been
prominently featured in the news. After pleading with the deputies
not to kill him, Williams was given five shocks to his chest with a
50,000 volt TASER while in four-point restraints. It was the second
such reported death at the jail in eight months. Ironically, the on-
going practice of torturing restrained inmates at GCDC was
documented in Kramer's Civil Rights action, in a witnessed affidavit
received by both Gwinnett County and PHS prior to either of the
aforementioned deaths.
"Based on the allegations of Mr. Kramer's complaint, and the
subsequent testimony of which we are aware, it appears that the
medical and security staff at the Gwinnett County Detention Center
violated every moral, ethical and professional standard that could
apply," states Isaac M. Jaroslawicz, former Executive Director and
Director of Legal Affairs of The Aleph Institute, a national non-
profit organization providing assistance to the Federal Bureau of
Prisons and numerous state and local Departments of Correction
throughout the United States.
PHS is the nation's largest private, for-profit, prison HMO
providing medical care to inmates in American jail and prisons. The
Associated Press reports that PHS defends itself against more than
1,000 lawsuits on any given day. According to forensic consultant,
Karen Russo, founder and director of The Wrongful Death
Institute, "PHS contracts with comparatively low cost, inexperienced
and system-intimidated physicians and health care providers. Medical
records are compromised and misrepresented in pursuit of cost-
reduction. Inappropriate or non-treatment of illness, withheld
doctor consultations, withheld medications, and administration of
incorrect medications are all easily documented. Incarcerated
patients incur both permanent disabilities or die."
Following Kramer's initial bond hearing, Gwinnett County Superior
Court Judge Debra K. Turner requested a written statement from his
rheumatologist. The physician's letter, faxed to the jail's
administrator under Judge Turner's own cover, concluded: "Mr. Kramer
is at risk for severe, recurrent, skin infection, complication of
arthritis, including blood borne seeding of diseased joint, which
would be disastrous. I recommend evaluation and appropriate
management of his arthritis and skin disease." A copy was also filed
with PHS and placed in Petitioner's medical jail records.
By the time Kramer was referred to a PHS-designated dermatologist,
medical records show that 80% of his body was covered with psoriatic
lesions. His medical treatment plan included prescribed medication,
access to sanitary conditions, daily medicated baths, regular
laboratory monitoring and medical follow-up. PHS Medical
Administrator Dwana Gebhardt, lacking any formal medical training,
failed to implement the plan for the de facto reason of PHS's money-
limiting policies. Against jail policy, records show that Gebhardt
even required Kramer to provide proof of his own medical insurance,
and then tried to bill them for treatment.
Making matters worse, Kramer's cervical spine was injured at the
jail when he then became victim of an unprovoked assault by a jail
guard. According to testimony before Judge Turner, an MRI showed
that damage had occurred to Kramer's vertebrae and "if left
untreated, could result in spinal cord damage and paralysis - loss
of function of anything below the level of the neck. He could lose
all ability to walk, talk, breathe, lower segments of the
respiratory tract, and functions of bowel and bladder." He was
prescribed cervical support and bedding until he could be seen by a
neurosurgeon, yet nearly three months later, PHS failed to
facilitate either. Even an unprecedented Court Order by the Judge
could not persuade PHS to comply.
Most surprising in the case was the position that a portable, non-
sacred bathtub was ordained a "baptismal pool" by the jail and thus
denied to Kramer, who is Jewish, from its use. Reverend Thomas
Coley's affidavit on record states: "[PHS] Medical personnel
advanced rumors that Mr. Kramer had AIDS and some other incurable
communicable disease, and that they were not going to waste their
time or resources on 'that Jew.'" Coley was warned to stay away
from Kramer because "the Sheriff's Department is going to hang that
Jewish son-of-a-#@&@
."
During his detention, Krame