Riverside County sheriff slapped with another lawsuit over inmate death

The parents of a San Jacinto woman who killed herself at a Riverside County jail are suing the county and Sheriff Chad Bianco alleging wrongful death and a failure to monitor inmates severely at risk for self-harm.

Alicia Upton, 21, was pronounced dead at 9:12 p.m. on April 28, 2022, at the Robert Presley Detention Center in Riverside, nearly an hour after she hanged herself with a bed sheet affixed to the bunk bed in her cell, according to the lawsuit.

Surveillance video recorded the entirety of the event, from the time Upton began crafting a noose from bed sheets at 8:14 p.m. until  the time she tied the noose around the top part of the bunk bed in her cell at 8:18 p.m. and then asphyxiated herself, according to the lawsuit filed Sunday, Dec. 31, in U.S. District Court in Riverside.

The suit alleges “county medical and custody staff had an opportunity to observe the clear signs of Ms. Upton’s acute suicidality.” Additionally, it alleges a “pattern and practice” of jail staff not conducting proper and timely welfare and safety checks on inmates.

Sheriff defends department

Bianco remained steadfast in his defense of his department and the actions of his jail deputies in a telephone interview on Tuesday, Jan. 2.

“This is nothing more than someone wanting money,” Bianco said. “We’re still in the same place where there’s no personal accountability for anything — just sue the person with the deepest pockets.”

Bianco said his department works hand in hand with Riverside University Health System to provide the best possible medical and mental health care to inmates in the county jail system.

“To say we’re responsible for a suicide is silly,” he said.

As to the surveillance video chronicling Upton’s suicide, Bianco declined to comment.

“That’s specifics about the lawsuit, and I haven’t seen the video, so I’m not going to comment on that,” he said.

‘I always kinda wanted to die’

Upton was arrested and booked into the Larry D. Smith Correctional Facility in Banning on April 19, 2022, on suspicion of criminal threats for allegedly threatening to stab a woman and threatening to kill her horses, Riverside County sheriff’s Sgt. Wendy Brito-Gonzalez said in an email.

During the booking process, detainees are assessed by a deputy for any medical problems or mental health issues they have that would require special attention. It was then that Upton, according to the lawsuit, told the deputy screening her, “I always kinda wanted to die.”

Upton was placed in a “safety cell” at the Banning jail before she was transferred two days later to the Robert Presley Detention Center in Riverside. There, she was also placed in a safety cell, and her mental health rating was classified as “severe,” according to the lawsuit.

Upton, according to the lawsuit, also displayed signs of self-injurious behavior, notably, 20 visible cut marks on her left arm. Yet on April 24, Upton was removed from her safety cell and placed in another cell that posed more of a risk because it had bed sheets and a bunk bed. She remained in that cell for four days even though she was “acutely suicidal” and in need of 24-hour monitoring as well as medical and psychological treatment, according to the lawsuit.

Bianco under fire

Riverside County came under fire for the number of inmate deaths at its jails in 2022. Upton was among 18 deaths, the highest number logged since 2005. More than a half-dozen lawsuits were filed in federal court in 2023 on behalf of inmates who died in Riverside County jails.

The ACLU and other activist and community groups rallied against the county and Bianco, demanding accountability and alleging excessive force by deputies and “inhuman conditions” at the jails.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta, in response to a letter by the ACLU demanding his office investigate, announced in February 2023 that his office was launching an investigation, which remains ongoing.

In October, Bianco blasted Bonta, the ACLU and other critics. He called their demands for an investigation a “political publicity stunt of the far left” and a “huge, disgusting political game.”

Source: Orange County Register