On November 17, 2021, 53-three-year-old Helen Renee Jackson was booked into Denton County Jail in Denton, Texas. While still an inmate, she died on December 29, 2021. The custodial death report (CDR) prepared by the Denton County Sheriff’s Office indicates that Ms. Jackson was being monitored every 30 minutes. The detention staff monitored her vital signs during each check. The day before her death, she was found non-responsive in her cell. She was pronounced dead after being transferred to a hospital.

Inmates Died of Diabetic Ketoacidosis

When inmates with diabetes are not given access to insulin, they are at risk of death. In April of 2019, a watchdog group reported about 12 diabetic inmates in jail or prison in the state of Georgia who died because they had not been given the insulin they needed. They all died from diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA). Only when diabetes goes untreated does DKA become fatal. Information about one of those deaths follows:

• Since he was in his twenties, Willie Green III had been a type 1 insulin-dependent diabetic. He died at age 41 in October 2017 eight days after being arrested and booked into Fulton County Jail. At the time of his arrest, Mr. Green’s blood sugar was so high that the appropriate action was to bring him to a hospital. Instead, he was placed in a cell at the jail. He was finally sent to a nearby hospital after his blood sugar was discovered to be four times higher than the normal range. His body had become “ice cold,” documents show. He allegedly had not received the insulin he needed, resulting in his death, the cause of which was determined to be DKA.

See Part 1 and Part 2 of this ongoing series.

This website is intended as a resource helpful to inmates who are now or have previously been incarcerated in Texas in a city or county jail. On this site, there is no intention of accusing persons or institutions of misdeeds.

–Guest Contributor