DUBLIN — Santa Rita Jail’s embattled health care provider is expected to pay at least $2.5 million for its role in the 2021 death of Maurice Monk, an inmate who laid motionless in his cell for days before anyone checked him for a pulse.
Wellpath’s settlement — announced Thursday by the attorneys for Monk’s children — follows a separate $7 million payout by Alameda County nearly two year ago, which also called for a series of reforms over how staff checks on inmates at the jail. The latest settlement includes about $2.3 million for Monk’s 22-year-old daughter, along with $250,000 for his 18-year-old son.
On Thursday, an attorney for Monk’s family said the accord came after a protracted fight with the medical provider, which recently emerged from bankruptcy after facing around 1,500 lawsuits over its performance at jails across the country. While Alameda County moved more quickly to settle, Wellpath engaged in “a corporate shell game,” said the attorney, Adante Pointer.
“Wellpath took a different path, and I think that’s indicative of the way they do business,” Pointer said. “They buried their head in the sand and forced the family to fight. That says a lot about the culture of Wellpath, and that certainly trickles down to the people who are delivering the care — or not delivering the care — as expected.”
“For his children, they’ll never be able to hug their dad, or text or call hm, or watch a movie with him,” Pointer added. “But they now have a much more secure financial base to go forward with their lives and achieve the goals they had shared with their dad while he was here.”
Wellpath representatives did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the settlement.
The deal comes as Wellpath seeks to renew its five-year, $250 million contract to provide health care at the jail, which has been a frequent target of lawsuits alleging staff negligence and abuse. The jail currently operates under a federal consent decree — which began after the death of another inmate — after dozens of inmates have died at the jail over the last decade.
Numerous community groups have pleaded with the Alameda Board of Supervisors to part ways with the medical provider. Multiple audits — including one presented to the supervisors last month — found the company has continuously fallen short of the 90-95% compliance rate needed for a satisfactory rating.
Often, the company’s staff doesn’t complete documentation of patient care, or properly manage inmates’ chronic conditions, the audits have found. There also exists an “urgent need” for retraining staff on a host of issues, including how to restrain inmates.
“It’s very well documented by way of our lawsuit, as well as the audit that was recently released, that Wellpath is underperforming, undeserving yet overcharging the taxpayers of Alameda County for substandard medical service,” Pointer said.
It also comes as 11 people — nine current or former Alameda County sheriff’s deputies, one Wellpath clinician and an Alameda County Behavioral Health doctor — face criminal charges in Monk’s death.
Monk was pronounced dead on Nov. 15, 2021, after his body laid face-down in his cell for days as a brown ooze seeped from beneath him. Security and deputy body-worn camera footage showed jailers repeatedly dropping pills and dinner plates into Monk’s cell while he laid motionless, without bothering to check if he was OK. At one point, another inmate who was helping deputies distribute food allegedly asked, “Are we just waiting for him to kick the bucket?”
Monk likely died long before deputies checked for his pulse, according to the lawsuit. When they finally dragged Monk’s stiff body out of the cell, the lettering on his jail garb was imprinted on the stained mattress, the lawsuit claimed.
At the time, Monk had been facing a misdemeanor charge of threatening a bus driver who asked him to wear a mask on a bus during the COVID-19 pandemic. He had been held on $2,500 bail.
The settlement highlights the need for Alameda County’s leaders to take medical care at the jail — and the contractor providing that service — more seriously, Pointer said.
“When they’re exposed for not doing their work, the county ends up with blood on its hands and money out of its pocket, because they have not supervised this contractor close enough,” Pointer said.
Jakob Rodgers is a senior breaking news reporter. Call, text or send him an encrypted message via Signal at 510-390-2351, or email him at jrodgers@bayareanewsgroup.com.
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