A Waco group says their quest to get the McLennan County Commissioners to end their relationship with LaSalle Corrections continues. The Waco Immigrants Alliance is now demanding a deeper investigation into the death of an inmate who died at the Jack Harwell Detention Center earlier this year.
“We held a vigil outside of the detention center to remember the lives that had been loss inside the Jack Harwell Detention Center,” said Hope Mustakim of the Waco Immigrants Alliance. “This is also tied into our campaign pushing county commissioners to break their contract with LaSalle.”
One of the latest inmates to die inside the jail was Lorenzo Ochoa-Figueroa. Although McLennan County Sheriff Parnell McNamara said that he died of natural causes, the Waco Immigrants Alliance say they want jail officials to investigate further into his death.
"We know that they say it was a natural cause, that only means it wasn't a homicide or a suicide,” said Mustakim. That doesn’t tell us much about the medical negligence that could have happened. We've received reports from inmates and family members who say he did not get his blood pressure medicine and had a heart attack."
The Waco Immigrants Alliance claim that jail officials did not call an ambulance soon enough. They believe if an ambulance was called sooner his life could have been spared.
"We've heard that the warden admitted that he was alive when he left the facility and our hospital is only a few minutes away,” said Mustakim.
During the vigil the group also talked about Michael Martinez. Jail officials said Martinez died from a suicide in 2015.
“Today was just a good time of solidarity and remembering the lives that were lost,” said Mustakim.
Lasalle Corrections is the company who runs the Jack Harwell Detention Center. In November they failed a special investigation after the Texas Commission on Jail Standards determined that not enough jailers were in their assigned wings to supervise inmates. In August the Jack Harwell Detention Center failed a another state inspection. The detention center has failed four inspections in the past four years.
On Tuesday, The Waco Immigrants Alliance say they plan to show up to the McLennan county Commissioners meeting to demand that commissioners cut ties with LaSalle Corrections.