Broward jail employee on leave after mentally ill inmate dies by suicide
MIAMI - A Broward jail employee is on paid leave after a mentally ill inmate died by suicide.
In October, Modeste left his mother's house in handcuffs accused of hitting her with a wooden pole, according to court records. Modeste's mother asked officers to get him help for mental illness, according to the arrest report.
Three months later, he died in the Broward jail.
"That tells us that our most vulnerable population, our mentally ill are not getting the adequate supervision, the adequate care and the adequate protection that is necessary to ensure they are safe," Broward Public Defender Gordon Weekes said.
Modeste's death Wednesday followed the tearful cries of Jenard Geffrard's family earlier in the week. Geffrard died after being attacked in the same jail. Another inmate, Kevin Barnes, choked and beat Geffrard, according to police records. Both men had mental illnesses that prevented them from being deemed competent to stand trial, Weekes said. By law, authorities had 14 days after such notice to transfer those inmates somewhere else for treatment.
"I thought he was safer in (the Broward jail) than in the streets," Marcia Irving, Geffrard's mother said Wednesday.
Weekes said Modeste was in a similar situation: Waiting in jail guarded by Sheriff Gregory Tony's staff.
"The parallels are very clear: It's a level of supervision that is lacking within that jail," said public defender Gordon Weekes. He wrote a letter to the sheriff with strong criticism and recommendations.
"It's 100% necessary," he said. "We have had a pattern within that jail that is screaming and begging outside oversight."
Sheriff Tony's office released a statement in response.
"The incident is under active investigation and one employee has been placed on administrative investigation leave with pay," the statement said.
In December of 2022, the sheriff wrote an open letter to criminal justice and community stakeholders about a "crisis" with mentally ill inmates at the jail. More than one in three inmates needed mental health care and had jail stays more than twice as long as similar inmates in years past, Sheriff Tony said in the letter. The situation cost taxpayers more than $117 million, Sheriff Tony wrote in the letter.
"What he focused on was the cost associated with the mentally ill and the housing and the treatment," Weekes said. "What I am arguing and that I am urging is not only that we look at the cost associated with treating the mentally ill in the jail but we look at the conditions in which we treat them and place them while they're in jail. You cannot continue to spend good money after bad money and you're not getting any good results. We have to get some results."
As we've been reporting for months, the mental health crisis has led to devastating outcomes in South Florida jails.
Jim DeFede explored the treatment of people who are mentally ill in the criminal justice system in his documentary, 'Warehoused.'