CHARLESTON – A Pleasants County woman says she suffered a stroke and other injuries after she was sprayed with pepper spray during a Division of Corrections training exercise.
Sherri Timmons filed her complaint against the West Virginia Department of Military Affairs and Public Safety and its sub-agency West Virginia Division of Corrections as well as Missouri-based Sabre Industries Inc., Sabre Exports Corporation Inc. and Security Equipment Corporation Inc., all doing business as Sabre Red. Earlier this year, the state Department of Military Affairs and Public Safety became the Department of Homeland Security.
"Sherri Timmons suffered a catastrophic brain injury that was completely avoidable," L. Dante diTrapano, one of the plaintiff's attorneys, told The West Virginia Record. "The State of West Virginia and Sabre Industries will need to answer for this horrific event."
diTrapano
According to her complaint, Timmons was hired as a prison guard at medium-security St. Mary’s Correctional Center in Pleasants County in April 2018. In November 2018, she says she received prison guard training in Glenville. After that training, she was told she needed to undergo OC spray training, or pepper spray training, to receive a raise and to allow her to carry pepper spray while on duty. OC stands for oleoresin capsicum, which is an oily concentrated extract from chili pepper plants.
After a 12-hour work shift, Timmons says she attended the pepper spray training across the road from the prison at a water plant. She says she took part in a lecture about pepper spray and its uses, but the “non-obvious risks” of pepper spray were not discussed. She says police grade spray is more than four times “hotter” than the world’s hottest pepper.
After the lecture, Timmons went outside to take part pepper spray exposure drill that required participants to take a shot of pepper spray to the face before subduing a simulated prisoner. She says she was anxious about being sprayed, and she says her employer knew of her anxiety issues because of her use of anti-anxiety medication.
Timmons volunteered to go first “to get the exercise behind her.” She was shot with a blast of pepper spray for 2-3 seconds. She says the spray, combined with the sub-freezing temperatures, caused her to take a deep breath. As a result, she inhaled the spray into her mouth and lungs. She says she then was shot with another 2-3 second blast of pepper spray, some of which also went into her mouth.
After completing the exercise and subduing the simulated prisoner, Timmons was assisted to an area where she was hosed off with nearly freezing cold water and given baby shampoo to wash her face to decontaminate herself. Then, she was taken to a picnic table to sit and clean off with some paper towels.
“When the second participant completed the training, he too made his way to the picnic table and plaintiff attempted to pass him the paper towels,” the complaint states. “She realized that she was losing the use of her arm and that it felt very heavy.”
She complained to officials doing the training, but she was told it was happening because of the exercise, the cold weather and that she was tired. She was told to go inside and sit near a heater to warm up.
When that didn’t help her condition, she complained again. She was told to go back inside. She says one official noticed the warning signs of cognitive symptoms such as confusion and memory loss, so Timmons was taken hours later to the prison medical unit. Her blood pressure was extremely high, and she could not smile when asked to do so.
Timmons was transported to Camden Clark Medical Center’s Emergency Department in Parkersburg. She then was transported to a tertiary care center at Ruby Memorial Hospital in Morgantown before being transferred to Health South Mountainview Rehabilitation Hospital in Parkersburg where she had to learn to walk, to talk and to perform daily living activities again.
Since she was released, Timmons says she has needed medical care and therapy that she will require the rest of her life. She was told she could return to work on a limited basis if she could pass a driving test, but she has not been able to do so. In fact, she says she can’t perform most of her activities of daily living.
The complaint details medical and scientific documents that show the dangerous and sometimes fatal effects of OC or pepper spray. It also explains how some similar organizations as the West Virginia Division of Corrections have stopped such testing procedures because of the danger and potential injury involved.
The complaint also describes Sabre as the number one “pepper spray trusted by policemen and consumers worldwide” and “delivers the most consistently potent pepper spray guarantee for maximum strength every single time.” It says Sabre’s slogan is “Making Grown Men Cry Since 1975.”
The plaintiff says she has suffered multiple areas of bleeding of the brain and many severe, permanent and life-threatening focal neurologic deficits as well as other injuries.
“Timmons is not going to be able to return to work,” the complaint states. “She has cognitive limitations due to the brain infarcts she suffered. She has emotional problems, including depression and worsened anxiety. She is unable to multitask, and she has difficulty with her own activities of daily living, including getting dressed. Plaintiff is unable to drive. As her hand condition worsens, plaintiff’s ability to do things will only worsen.”
She accuses the West Virginia DMAPS of negligence in selection of OC products for training, of negligence for the creation and implementation of OC spray training, of negligence for mandating OC spray training and for deliberate intent. She accuses the Sabre defendants of strict liability/failure to warn, of negligent failure to warn and of intentional failure to warn.
Timmons seeks economic and non-economic compensatory and punitive damages, court costs, attorney fees and other relief.
She is being represented by diTrapano, Alex McLaughlin and Benjamin Adams of Calwell Luce diTrapano in Charleston as well as by David Sims of the Law Offices of David A. Sims in Parkersburg. The case has been assigned to Circuit Judge Jennifer Bailey.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number 20-C-1001
