A $17.5 million settlement will reportedly be granted to Seth Fletcher, a 21-year-old man who was attacked by correctional officers.
The unfortunate incident happened in 2020, when Fletcher was two months away from his release from the Chillicothe Correctional Institution when two prison guards tackled and struck him with “sadistic and malicious force” which resulted in critical injuries, including quadriplegia.
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On April 2, 2020, Fletcher was knocked to the ground and complained that he couldn’t feel or move his legs. Guards failed to take his complaint seriously and dropped him multiple times after the initial injury. When he was unable to get himself a drink of water, guards poured water into his mouth and up his nose, according to the Ohio Highway Patrol report.
Fletcher had been serving a two-year prison term for pandering sex material involving minors when he was 18. The offense involved a consensually made videotape with his girlfriend, who was a couple years younger than the then-18-year-old Fletcher.
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“The torture and crippling of a prisoner in America sounds medieval. Yet it happened, here, in America, in 2020,” Attorney Geoffrey Fieger said in a statement.
“As horrific as this case is, I want to thank the Ohio Attorney General’s office and Governor Dewine for accepting responsibility in this most horrific of cases. This abuse should never happen again,”
Fletcher filed his federal civil rights case against two dozen Ohio prison security and nursing staff members on April 15, 2020.
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According to the complaint, the two officers, “did in fact, participate in, authorized, ratified and/or failed to intervene to prevent sadistic, malicious and excessive uses of force under the circumstances, and acted willfully, wantonly, maliciously and with deliberate indifference to and callous disregard for Seth Fletcher’s constitutional rights, and in a manner that shocks the conscience and offends traditional notions of decency.”
The Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction declined to comment on the lawsuit, saying details were still being finalized.
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