On April 14, 2022, a custodial death report regarding Chauncey Elmer Toombs was filed by the Kaufman County Sheriff’s Department in Kaufman, Texas. Mr. Toombs entered the jail on the morning of April 12, 2022, and was pronounced dead the next evening. Hanging/strangulation is listed as the means of death, though the official cause of death is pending the results of an autopsy.

Inspectors with the Texas Commission on Jail Standards (TCJS) conduct annual jail inspections to monitor whether minimum jail standards are being upheld. Many times, areas of noncompliance are associated with the important issue of inmate supervision. Suicide being the number one cause of death in jails, suicide prevention measures are crucial.

Beefing up supervision has been a most successful component in preventing inmate suicide, according to research. In spite of this well-known inmate suicide prevention measure, Texas county jail practices tend to go against the idea of prioritizing the supervision of inmates, even for those who are most at risk for suicide.

In custodial death reports for inmates who committed suicide in a Texas county jail, there is usually an indication that the inmate was in a single cell, even in cases when he or she made statements indicating that they are potentially at risk for suicide. Single cells are single-occupancy cells, and this type of isolation tends to accommodate acts of suicide.

Learn more in Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of this continuing series.

On this website, implicating persons or institutions in acts of wrongdoing is never intended. The goal of each post on this site is to provide a potentially helpful resource to benefit inmates in Texas county jails.

–Guest Contributor