Gravely Ill Inmates Awaiting Trial in Hays County Jail See No Improvements

Hays County Jail, where some inmates report horrible health care (photo by Jana Birchum)

It's been three months since we last reported on life-threatening medical problems going unaddressed in Hays County Jail, and there's no indication things have gotten better. Instead, we're finding new cases of great concern.

After years of going untreated for hepatitis C, Hays County Jail inmate John Thomas has stage 4 liver disease and a host of health problems related to it. Before being incarcerated at the jail in October he was on a list to receive a liver transplant. Now the transplant has been called off and he's wondering how much time he has left.

"I have a doctor in San Antonio who could tell me how much time I have to live ... but they refuse to let me have an appointment with him," Thomas said, referring to jail officials. "They said they'd put me with a [gastroenterologist]. Whether they've done this or not I don't know."

Hays County Jail officials say privacy laws prohibit them from commenting on Thomas' case or those of other inmates. They insist the jail is doing an appropriate job. "The inmates have been evaluated and offered care and medication according to jail protocol and physician's orders," Cap­tain Julie Villalpando said in a statement.

Thomas was serving 10 years of probation for a DWI offense when he was arrested for allegedly assaulting his wife last year. With his probation revoked, Thomas was sent to jail with several medications – among them spironolactone, a medicine used to keep fluid from building up in his abdomen – which were confiscated by jail officials. After two months of asking for the medications and not receiving them, Thomas wound up in the hospital in Novem­ber, where doctors recommended, predictably, that he see a liver physician. Thomas told us that still hasn't seen one. He said that after returning to jail he began to receive spironolactone but continued to go untreated for esophageal varices and a baseball-sized hernia.

Over the Christmas holiday, Thomas was again taken to the emergency room with fluid in his abdomen. His wife, Randi Franks, says doctors told Thomas he needed to see a liver doctor and a gastroenterologist within a week. "John was told that ... supposedly the jail will schedule him an appointment," Franks said. "But that was also said in November and it never happened."

In September we profiled Melvin Nich­olas, another inmate who, after his repeated requests for care were ignored, had two near-death experiences that caused jail administrators to rush him to the emergency room. Since his most recent hospitalization, Nicholas has developed painful lumps in his arms, neck, and shoulder. He has no idea what they are. "This lump on my shoulder is throbbing like a toothache," he said. "They say I'm scheduled to see the provider and I never see the provider. I put in these request forms to see somebody and nothing's happening."

Nicholas, who is charged with murder and other offenses, has a $430,000 bond and said he has asked his attorney to try to get it lowered so he can seek medical care outside of jail. Nicholas said the attorney has not responded (nor he has he found time to speak with the Chronicle as of yet). "The last time I talked with him, discussing my case, was December of last year," Nicholas said.

Inmate Ranulfo Benitez-Morales has seen five doctors since we told his story last Aug­ust but still hasn't had surgery to remove metal fragments that were found in his leg after he was shot with a lead pellet round during a 2021 arrest. The leg has been swollen to twice its normal size for 15 months.

Benitez-Morales ticked off the responses of the doctors the county has sent him to: "The first doctor said it needed to be operated on. Second doc said he just does upper body. Third doc said she only does stuff on the top of the skin. The fourth doc was an orthopedic doc, she said she doesn't do stuff like that, she only does bones. The fifth doc said he would do it but then decided not to.

"And every time I go, they don't have my medical records. I already got X-rays, I got an MRI, and I got ultrasounds on my leg, but every time I get there it's like the jail don't send my medical records to them, to know everything we did."

Like Nicholas, Benitez-Morales is a pretrial detainee. He's been charged with a number of offenses related to resisting arrest but has not been convicted of anything. Rather, he is waiting in jail for his trial because he doesn't have the money to get out on bond, the financial portion of which is $157,000. He too would like to get his bond reduced so that he can find a doctor willing to remove the metal fragments in his leg. "We're gonna try to see what they can do, see if we can get a lower bond," Nicholas said. "And then I can find a doctor myself."