Arturo Gomez, age 59, was arrested by the La Joya Police Department and placed in the city’s municipal jail on April 17, 2022. Tragically, he died less than 4 hours later on April 18. The address of the La Joya Municipal Jail is the same as that of the City of La Joya Police Department, that being 701 E. Expressway 83 in La Joya, Texas, 78560, Hidalgo County. The custodial death report (CDR) states that the cause of death is unknown and pending results from the medical examiner.

County Jails: When Timing Can Be Everything

Statistics regarding jail suicide frequently indicate that suicide is the number one cause of death in county jails. The National Institute of Corrections (NIC) conducted an in-depth study of suicides in U.S. jails for the year 2005-2006. The total number of jail suicides that year, according to the report, was 464. Statistics on the length of confinement prior to suicide are in the report, including the following, which reflects the three timeframes with the most suicides:

• 22.68% of the jail suicides occurred within the first 24 hours of incarceration.
• 26.6% of jail suicides occurred on days 2-14.
• 20.1% occurred within months 1 through 4.

The supervision of inmates is recognized as a deterrent to suicide. The NIC report shows the following statistics related to the time span between the last observation of an inmate and finding the suicide victim:

• 20.7% of the victims had been observed less than 15 minutes before being discovered.
• 22.25% were observed in the 15 to 30 minutes previous to being found.
• 18.8% were found when it was 30 to 60 minutes since the last face-to-face check.
• 22.4% of the inmates were observed between 1 and 3 hours before committing suicide.
• 8.4% were discovered when more than 3 hours had passed since the last observation.
• In the case of 7.5% of the inmates, the time span since being observed is shown as unknown.

Learn more in this ongoing series.

Making speculations about persons or entities having participated in wrongdoing is never intended on this website. Each post added to this site is meant as a resource of benefit to inmates now or formerly incarcerated in a Texas county jail.

–Guest Contributor