While held alone in a cell on the second floor of the Graham County Jail, Rydell fatally cut himself on June 2 with a broken prison-issued razor.

Hewitt told the newspaper that in the months and days leading up to his death, Rydell was not only denied a video visit with his doctor to renew his prescription, but was battling bronchitis. asthma.

Hewitt said the morning after he was transferred from Gila County to GCDC, detainee officers found “a dozen or so” in the ceiling area of ​​the pod where Rydell and the newly transferred inmates were held. ‘ launched a mace bomb. Rydell had a severe asthma attack requiring the use of a nebulizer. This is the device Hewitt was told by the head nurse, Roxanna Blunt, after Rydell’s death was not present in jail. Then, Hewitt said, Brandt hung up on her.

“‘Oh my god, this is crazy,'” Hewitt recalled thinking. .

Hewitt said Monday he was charged $60 for a video consultation, but Reidell said he never did. When her husband continued to complain of trouble breathing and pain in her chest, Hewitt called the prison’s medical department. “The prison medical staff… told her they couldn’t help,” she said, according to a note she obtained from the Graham County Sheriff’s Office regarding the recording of the conversation between the two of them. [him].”

Hewitt began contacting the ACLU.

Hewitt also questioned Rydell’s mental health support as his physical health reportedly deteriorated. reported that there were no mental health services.

Though he made dejected comments about being “burdened” or “paying for another truck,” Hewitt never believed her husband was actually suicidal

However, the inmates being held with Rydell weren’t all that surprised.

The lead investigator in Rydell’s death was Graham County Sheriff’s Office Detective Jason Bowman.

The GSCO report on the case includes interviews with multiple inmates, including inmate Christopher Rainey, who, during an emergency, was forced out of his cell for recreational time. and warned police of the danger), two inmates (Timothy Zipperer and Stéphane Bernhardt) committed suicide. “

Timothy Zippler, who shared a cell wall with Rydell, said, “Every time someone did a cell test, Rydell would ask about getting a razor.

“Timothy said this happened about five or six times,” the report said.

Stefan Bernhard, who also lived right next door to Rydell, who had known Rydell for only three or four days, told Detective Bowman: [June 2] I passed on his request to both Bernhardt and detainee Josh Halverson.

“Everyone here is depressed,” said inmate Bernhardt. He added that he was “surprised” that suicides were not on the rise. Help, you don’t have to be in a pod.

“Bernhardt told us that he had reported people in need of spiritual help and that medical care had come and evaluated them and then left. [he] He told us he didn’t say anything about Rydell,” Bowman’s memo states.

In a conversation with current prison warden Mike Cochrane, he said that shaving in prison is part of inmate hygiene.

“The blades are very thin,” he said of the razors issued for shaving inmates, which were designed specifically for prison use.

Inmates can request the use of razors, after which detainees will return to their cells to retrieve them, Cochrane said. Shaving is not supervised, he confirmed. All inmates can ask for a razor. “If they’re on suicide watch, they’re not going to get it,” he said.

Since 1993, at least 15 prisoner civil rights cases—three alleging lack of medical care—have been filed against the GCDC, but most have been dismissed due to missed filing dates.

In most of these cases, the prisoners had been transferred to other prison facilities at least once, former inmate Joseph “Joe” Signorelli said in the newspaper, a tactic called “diesel therapy.” rice field. Movement of prisoners that may be gaining momentum in lawsuits.

“That’s how they won the lawsuit,” he said in a phone conversation on Oct. 3.

In a 38-page complaint filed on September 28, 2009, Signorelli, who received full social security benefits for permanent work-related injuries, was sentenced to prison sentences after being held for more than two years. claimed inadequate medical care. , was terrible.

“They would bring medicine, sometimes double the dose, and say, ‘If you don’t take it, you can’t take it next time,'” he said. “Then they skip the day.”

Signorelli said he sometimes went two or three days without taking prescribed painkillers. He described the process as “very expensive” or going through a withdrawal.

Sometimes, he said, his medicine ran out before it should.

Despite multiple requests for ADA consideration, Signorelli’s complaint was not answered.

“I have a lot of kites that are about 12 inches. [deep] It’s worth it,” he said of the complaint he wrote. In a follow-up call on November 6, Signorelli said he had written to his ACLU and received a response that it was not accepting any cases involving the criminal system at the time.

He also reached out to The Justice Project. But they’re dealing with his DNA evidence, which would be useless in his particular case.

When Signorelli was finally transferred to Phoenix, the jail was unable to include his medical documentation, which is standard procedure, according to current prison warden Mike Cochrane.

As a result, Signorelli told the newspaper that he was denied medication. [to withdraw] Because they didn’t have my records,” he said.

He said he had received no pain medication during his entire imprisonment.

“For me, it’s ten and a half years of cruel and extraordinary punishment,” he said. “No one should be treated like that.”

“The treatment in Graham County was much worse than the DOC,” he said. “Their treatment there was subpar to me. It was subhuman,” he said. It was a hell hole. It was nothing good.

The federal government has determined that I am 100 percent disabled,” he said. “Graham County said no. They broke me and brought me to my knees.”

And the late Matthew “Mutt” Edward Sherman wrote in a complaint filed on October 27, 2009: Simple inmate demands were not answered, let alone complaints. “

Treatment questions

An addiction victim, Sherman from Safford spent a total of about eight years in jail due to numerous arrests. His mother, Melissa Sherman, told the newspaper in a late October call that local law enforcement “hated” her son. All the soles of his feet were torn off,” she said. She was said to have climbed a brick wall in her bare feet in an attempt to escape.

At VA Hospital Tuscon, Sherman’s scheduled mental health evaluation was reportedly postponed due to concerns over the condition of his leg.

“The soles of his feet were just ragged,” said Melissa Sherman. “I don’t know what happened.”

In a follow-up conversation, she recalled what happened during another prison visit, which made her feel strange. Her husband threatened to hire a lawyer, but the family never filed any charges.

“We didn’t do anything,” she said. “I never thought I could get help from the outside if I couldn’t get anything from the locals,” she added.

As a third generation Safford area, Melissa Sherman has lived in Graham County all her life.

She said she contacted former Graham County Sheriff Frank Hughes about her son.

“It was like talking about Jeffrey Dahmer,” she recalled. He told her, “That’s not your son.”

“They hated him,” she said of the local crackdown on her son.

Melissa Sherman recalls making an appointment with Kenneth Larson, a Physician Assistant (PA) in prison medical, to talk about her son’s mental health care, and when Larson asked who her son was, she was stunned. I observed what I saw and was shocked.

“How can I tell you, his mouth was wide open and I almost fell off my chair,” she said. “If only his facial expressions could speak…”

While her son was on Risperador for a period of time, she said she wasn’t sure if he ever took drugs for mental health while incarcerated.

“When I tried to ask people there, they were covering themselves,” she said.

Melissa Sherman said of her son, who died in 2021 after being hit by a car in Tucson, “I was bitten and vomited.”

Sherman said she had voicemails from him on her cell phone for days when she needed to hear his voice.

“He’s here,” she said, turning to the kitchen where houseplants softened the wallpapered walls. it won’t.”