Death of sixth inmate at Montgomery County Jail prompts internal review

DAYTON — The Montgomery County Jail said a sixth inmate has now died at the jail this year.

On any day there are 400 to 600 people inside the facility, and about two weeks ago, a 47-year-old man had a medical problem that had staff attempting extreme life-saving measures.

>> Previous Coverage: Inmate death under investigation at Montgomery County Jail

“Which included the use of Narcan, they performed CPR, they also used an AED because they detected an irregular heart rhythm, so they used the AED several times,” said Montgomery County Chief Deputy and jail director Matt Haines.

He said any death of someone being held here is a tragedy and the fact that it has happened six times in the first six months of this year is troubling.

47-year-old Gerald Ford was booked on June 10th. 10 hours later he had a medical episode in his cell and could not be revived at the jail or at the hospital.

>> Previous Coverage: ‘It’s shocking to us;’ Montgomery County Jails seeing ‘troubling’ number of inmate deaths

He had been placed in a direct supervision unit because of information they received when Ford was booked in, and his problem was noticed right away.

News Center 7 previously reported the deaths of five other inmates who died this year.

The coroner’s office determined three of the deaths resulted from drug overdoses, another was attributed to extensive poor health issues and the last is undetermined.

Now sheriff’s office and jail staff are investigating another death. They say all available information will be looked at, including reviewing the video cameras that cover almost every spot in the facility.

“Right away we started looking into it, to review those videos and see if it could help us determine if anything happened or if there was something inside the walls of that cell that we needed to look for. That appears to not be the case at this point in time,” Haines said.

Ford’s death is the subject of a county coroner’s investigation and an internal review, which is standard for every time someone dies at the jail or after being taken to the hospital from there.

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