Thomas Carr (Photo from WXYZ video)
Wayne County has agreed to pay $7 million to settle a lawsuit over the brutal murder of an inmate last summer due to systematic failures inside the jail, Ross Jones of WXYZ reports. The inmate was serving a sentence for a DUI.
Jones notes that a WXYZ investigation into the case served as the basis for the lawsuit.
The county's settlement, its largest involving negligence since at least 2010, was approved by the county commission last month. A judge must still approve it.
The tragedy began when Thomas Carr, 53, came to the Wayne County Jail last July to serve a sentence for a DUI.
But 24 hours after he arrived, he was beaten to death by his cellmate, Claude Lewis, in an attack that jail officials say may have lasted hours, WXYZ reports. Lewis had a history of mental illness and violence and should not been housed in the same cell.
Jones reports that a guard who was supposed to make the rounds at the time of the murder, did not. He was suspended and eventually resigned.
“Considering the potential exposure of liability, it could have been worse,” Commissioner Sam Baydoun tells WXYZ.
