Ahead of Magbie's sentencing, a staff member in Retchin's chambers contacted the office of Chief Judge Rufus G. King III to find out whether the D.C. Corrections Department would be able to house a paralyzed person in a wheelchair. The answer from the chief judge's office, which is the liaison with Corrections, was yes.
Leah Gurowitz, a court spokeswoman, said yesterday that the full extent of Magbie's paralysis was inadvertently not relayed to the chief judge's office.
Sandy Thomas and her great-nephew Anthony Smith are among several relatives and friends of Jonathan Magbie at a candlelight vigil outside the D.C. jail.
(Marvin Joseph -- The Washington Post)
|
_____D.C. Government_____
•
D.C. Stadium Traffic Seen as Not All Bad (The Washington Post, Oct 1, 2004)
•
Security Widened At IMF, World Bank (The Washington Post, Oct 1, 2004)
•
For Baseball, Love at Third Sight (The Washington Post, Sep 30, 2004)
•
Minorities Driving Growth in D.C. Area (The Washington Post, Sep 30, 2004)
•
More Stories
|
| |
|
In a statement yesterday, Retchin said she was led to believe "that Mr. Magbie's medical needs could be met; this was such an unintended tragedy. I would like to convey my deepest sympathy to Mr. Magbie's family."
Even the Correctional Treatment Facility, a jail annex that houses many inmates with medical or security needs, would not have been able to readily care for a prisoner such as Magbie, Philip Fornaci, executive director of the D.C. Prisoners' Legal Services Project, said yesterday.
"I certainly would not say they killed him or any conclusion like that," Fornaci said. "But it certainly seems likely that he wouldn't have died if he hadn't gone to jail."
The initial medical evaluation of Magbie after his arrival at the D.C. jail on Sept. 20 found him in need of "acute medical attention," according to the Corrections Department. Within hours, Magbie was moved to Greater Southeast Community Hospital.
The nature of the medical problem was not specified in a chronology issued by the Corrections Department, which declined to make officials available to comment on the specifics of the case. The timeline shows that Magbie arrived at the jail at 2 p.m. and that he was taken to the hospital at 9:40 p.m. What happened in between is not explained.
The next day, Magbie was discharged and placed in the Correctional Treatment Facility, the jail annex that is operated by Corrections Corporation of America under a contract with the city. But almost from the moment Magbie arrived there, a senior doctor was concerned that Magbie might not receive the care he needed, according to his mother and a court official.
The court official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the doctor believed that Magbie belonged at the hospital and pressed Greater Southeast, which handles inmate hospitalizations, to take him back. But the hospital rebuffed the request, the official said.
Hoping to change the hospital's mind, the physician asked Retchin to issue a court order, the official said. But the judge declined, saying she lacked the authority to issue any such order.
The hospital said in a statement that it could not comment because of federal privacy regulations. It said that it provides "top-quality" care.
Apparently resigned to having him stay on at the jail annex, the medical staff decided after a couple of days of back-and-forth with Magbie's mother and attorney to allow Magbie's mother to bring his ventilator.
Told to bring the device down Friday morning, she did, showing up about 10 a.m. A half-hour earlier, she would later learn, her son had been taken by ambulance back to Greater Southeast.
That night, she received a call from a warden telling her that her son was dead.
