Jail officers refused to offer him his center transplant drugs. Days later, he used to be lifeless.

Dexter Barry used to be arrested closing November following an altercation with a neighbor. Five days later, he used to be lifeless, after prison officers refused to offer him the important drugs for his center transplant.

Accordingly to The Tributary, a information outlet primarily based in Jacksonville, Florida, Barry used to be arrested on November 18, after a neighbor reported him to the police for allegedly threatening to “beat him up” following a longer dispute over Wi-Fi. While the 2 by no means bodily fought, Barry used to be however arrested on a easy attack rate.

During his time in police custody, Barry—who had won a center transplant in October 2020—incessantly insisted that he had to take explicit day-to-day medicines to forestall his frame from rejecting his new center. According to frame digital camera photos of the incident, Barry advised a police officer no less than seven occasions that he wanted this drugs to live on.

When Barry gave the impression in court docket the morning after his arrest, court docket transcripts display that he as soon as once more asked get right of entry to to his anti-rejection drugs.

“I’m on medication,” Barry advised Judge Gilbert Feltel. “I just had a heart transplant, and I haven’t taken my medicine all day since I have been locked up, and I take rejection medicines for my heart so my heart won’t reject it, and I’m almost two years out …. And the medicine that I’m taking, it’s like a 30-day prescription that’s like $2,400.”

“OK. Here’s what I’ll do, Mr. Dexter,” spoke back Feltel. “I am going to simply set a bond in your 503 case and add the additional condition of no violent victim contact.” While Barry used to be launched on November 20, his son and a attorney for the circle of relatives say that Barry by no means won his drugs whilst in prison. By the time he used to be launched, he had ignored no less than 5 doses.

Despite resuming his drugs, Barry’s well being declined over the following few days, and he died on November 23, simply 3 days after being launched. A pathologist employed by way of Barry’s circle of relatives reported that his explanation for dying used to be his frame’s rejection of his center transplant.

Andrew Bonderud, the circle of relatives’s legal professional, speculated that prison officers did not download Barry’s drugs because of its price. “Records from jail will likely show they made a note of it,” Bonderud advised The Tributary, ,[The Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office (JSO)] identified it is a particularly pricey drugs and the way disgusting if it seems that this used to be a industry choice for the JSO, that they might reasonably now not pay for the medicine. They would reasonably chance dying over a industry choice. It’s one of the outrageous circumstances I’ve ever noticed on this town of JSO misconduct.”

While the pathologist declined in charge Barry’s dying only on prison officers’ refusal to acquire his important drugs, it is transparent that JSO officials had been, at very best, reckless with Barry’s well being—and at worst, contributed to his avoidable dying.

“The police officer could’ve gone inside and got his medication,” Barry’s son advised The Tributary, “This man is telling you, my heart needs those meds. A two-minute walk would’ve saved his life.”