Mom Whose Son’s Death Led to Jail Reforms Wins Settlement

A mother whose son died less than an hour after he was transported from a Missouri jail to a state prison has won a $1.2 million settlement in a case that helped lead to suspensions, firings and reforms.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports that Angela Malcich claimed in the suit that nurses and guards at the St. Louis County Justice Center repeatedly ignored the serious medical distress of her son, Daniel Stout.

Stout was arrested June 3, 2019 on a parole revocation and spent the next eight days in the county jail. The night before his death, Stout complained of stomach pains but was told he would have to wait until the morning to see a nurse, the suit claims.

That morning, though, jail staff told a worsening Stout that he would need to wait for care again until he could be transported more than an hour to the state prison in Bonne Terre. Upon arriving, he was vomiting blood and died before emergency crews could get there.

An autopsy blamed complications of an ulcer that perforated his intestine.

Four other inmates also died in the county jail in 2019, with an internal report finding that all of them had acted “strangely” beforehand and that most were denied medical care.