CHARLESTON – The estate of a Mercer County man blames inadequate healthcare for his suicide while incarcerated.
Maynard Meadows, as administrator of the estate of Mark Adam Meadows, filed his complaint July 21 in Kanawha Circuit Court against PrimeCare Medical of West Virginia. Maynard Meadows is the father of Mark Meadows.
“This is another instance where our system totally mismanaged a young man’s mental health crisis which resulted in his death,” attorney L. Dante diTrapano told The West Virginia Record. “We keep hoping things will get better, but they keep getting worse.
diTrapano
“Our law firm (Calwell Luce diTrapano) and Forbes Law jointly have more than 25 wrongful death cases against the jail and their providers in litigation. It’s an epidemic.”
According to the complaint, Mark Meadows was jailed January 18, 2022, at Southern Regional Jail on a malicious wounding charge. PrimeCare staff handled his intake screening, and there were medical records from his previous incarcerations that showed a history of severe mental illness, suicide attempts and severe substance use disorders.
He was placed on opiate detox protocol, including medications to alleviate withdrawal symptoms and regular assessment of his vitals and symptoms. But medical records show PrimeCare did not conduct proper assessments of Meadows from January 18 to January 28, only checking him a total of two times in that span rather than at least twice a day, according to the complaint.
The complaint says proper mental health assessment wasn’t done for Meadows as well. It also says other inmates observed him speaking incoherently and exhibiting “extremely belligerent and erratic behavior in telephone calls during his incarceration.”
“An investigator with the West Virginia State Police reviewed recordings of Mr. Meadows’ telephone conversations and concluded that he was ‘clearly not well mentally,’” the complaint states.
On January 27, 2022, just before midnight, PrimeCare staff evaluated Meadows for abdominal pain, but failed to recognize or document erratic delusional behavior reported by cellmates and the State Police investigator, according to the complaint. The following morning during the pill pass, it says PrimeCare staff again failed to recognize or document the behavior.
It says PrimeCare didn’t arrange for a qualified mental health provider to treat Meadows, and he wasn’t placed on a suicide watch “despite exhibiting clear symptoms that a reasonable health care provider would recognize as indicative of a high risk of self-harm.”
Meadows repeatedly complained of stomach pain over several days, even telling PrimeCare staff and other he would rather die than deal with the intense stomach pain, according to the complaint.
“After Mark Meadows suffered 10 days of neglected physical and mental pain, a corrections officer found Mr. Meadows unconscious in his cell with a bed sheet tied around his neck,” the complaint states. “Resuscitation efforts were unsuccessful, and Mark Meadows died at SRJ on January 28, 2022.”
The estate accuses PrimeCare of medical negligence, vicarious liability and negligent training and supervision. It seeks compensatory damages for Mark Meadows’ pain and suffering prior to his death, the sorrow and emotional suffering of his beneficiaries and the loss of support to his beneficiaries. It also seeks punitive damages, pre- and post-judgment interests, attorney fees, court costs and other relief.
The estate is being represented by diTrapano and Charles F. Bellomy of Calwell Luce diTrapano in Charleston and by W. Jesse Forbes and Jennifer N. Taylor of Forbes Law Offices in Charleston. The case has been assigned to Circuit Judge Tera Salango.
Kanawha Circuit Court case number 23-C-623