Lincoln County, Nebraska reached a settlement in a inmate suicide lawsuit with the sister of the decedent.
Sounds like a tough claim, right? The wrongful death lawsuit claims that his jailers failed, “to properly monitor [the victim]” and that they should have known he was a suicide risk. Why? Because a reasonable person would know he was trying to kill himself when he got arrested in the first place. Helping the case: the victim never should have been arrested in the first place, a grand jury later found.
A sympathetic victim also probably drove the settlement. He suffered post-traumatic stress disorder after serving in the military from 2001 to 2004 (presumably in Iraq or Afghanistan).
Interestingly, the article on the case says the man’s sister brought the lawsuit. In most jurisdictions, including Maryland, a sister has no rights under the wrongful death act.