IN THE SECOND JUDICIAL CIRCUIT COURT
IN AND FOR LEON COUNTY, FLORIDA
ESTATE OF JACK P. KING,
CASE NO.: 2012 CA 2060
Plaintiff,
-vFLORIDA DEPARTMENTOF CORRECTIONS,
and INDIVIDUAL FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF
CORRECTIONS MEDICAL PROVIDERS,
Defendants.
____________________________________/
COMPLAINT
VIOLATION OF THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION, 8TH AMENDMENT, AND
THE FLORIDA CONSTITUTION, ARTICLE I, SECTION 17, BAN ON CRUEL AND
UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT AS A RESULT OF DELIBERATE INDIFFERENCE TO
SERIOUS MEDICAL NEEDS; AND MEDICAL MALPRACTICE
THE ESTATE OF JACK P. KING, (hereinafter “Plaintiff”), hereby sues the Defendants
FLORIDA
DEPARTMENT
OF
CORRECTIONS,
and
INDIVIDUAL
MEDICAL
PROVIDERS, (hereinafter “Defendants”), for callous and intentional refusal to diagnose and
treat and deliberate indifference to serious medical needs that were obvious and so grossly
incompetent and inadequate as to shock the conscience in violation of cruel and unusual
punishment prohibition of the 8th Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I,
Section 17, of the Florida Constitution, and medical malpractice. As grounds therefore, Plaintiff
asserts:
Parties, Jurisdiction and Venue
1.
Plaintiff, THE ESTATE OF JACK P. KING, is, and at all times the representative
of JACK P. KING, who was a former national water ski champion from Pensacola, Florida, and
at all times material to this Complaint was an inmate of the Florida Department of Corrections,
inmate number DC 867271, for parole violations, who died from callous, intentional and
malicious refusal to diagnose and treat pancreatic cancer the size of a baseball (7.0 x 6.4 x 6.0
cm) and having eaten up the entire pancreas with lymph nodes replaced by cancer, after over 6
months of requesting diagnosis and treatment, and receiving only aspirin. See Autopsy Report,
Attached as Exhibit A.
2.
Plaintiffs, SURVIVORS OF JACK P. KING, is, and at all times material to this
Complaint were the son, granddaughter, sister, brother-in-law, and nephew of JACK P. KING.
3.
Defendant, FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS, OFFICE OF
HEALTH SERVICES (“DOC”), is a State of Florida governmental entity with its headquarters
in Tallahassee, Florida, and is responsible for complying with U.S. and Florida Constitutional
standards against cruel and unusual punishment.
4.
Defendants, MEDICAL PERSONNEL, of the FLORIDA DOC, are medical
providers hired to provide medical care consistent with professional, civil and constitutional
standards. All medical providers subject to claims of medical negligence are unknown to
Plaintiff, but all were agents and under the employ of the Florida DOC. Pursuant to section
766.106 (2) and (3), Florida Statutes (2012), Presuit Notice, and Presuit Investigation by
Prospective Defendant, this Complaint against DOC is being served upon the Florida DOC and
WCI as an intent to initiate litigation for medical negligence, and to begin the 90 day presuit
investigative period, and to permit the Defendants, such as WCI Nurse Amy Kirkland, to
complete the review required under section 766.203 (3), Florida Statutes (2012), to determine the
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liability of each Defendant.
Defendants are hereby requested to and are required through
informal discovery to provide all discoverable information, including all documentation in the
Plaintiff’s DOC files and all providers of medical care to Plaintiff by DOC and its medical
providers, to the Plaintiff pursuant to section 766.203 (6), Florida Statutes (2012).
5.
This is a constitutional and civil tort action for violation of U.S. and Florida
Constitutional standards against cruel and unusual punishment, and medical negligence.
Statutory notice and service of process under Florida Statutes section 768.28 (2012), has been
provided to the DOC and the Florida Department of Financial Services.
6.
Venue is appropriate in the Second Judicial Circuit, Leon County, Florida, as the
Defendant, FLORIDA DOC has its main offices in the Second Judicial Circuit, Leon County,
Florida, and the Plaintiff, ESTATE OF JACK P. KING, representing the interests of JACK P.
KING, who was an inmate at Wakulla Correctional Institution (“WCI”) during the operative time
frame, which is also in the Second Judicial Circuit, and the damages exceed the statutory
minimum for circuit court jurisdiction.
General Allegations
7.
Plaintiff, JACK P. KING, was an inmate within the Florida DOC, sentenced for
12 years on a suspended sentence, for violation of probation as a result of Florida’s and Judge
Kathleen Decker’s abdication of judging such probation violations, imposing zero tolerance for
any and all probation violations regardless of the facts and circumstances, and sentencing all
inmates without judging to the entire suspended sentence.
8.
JACK P. KING’s sentence for violation of probation was a death sentence.
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His inmate number was DC 867271. The relevant corrections facility during the operative facts
was the WCI, 110 Melaleuca, Drive, Crawfordville, Florida 32327.
9.
This is consistent with the United State’s denial of humane treatment and respect
for its citizens nationwide, and particularly in Southern States, where the incarceration rates and
lengths of sentencing exceed that of any dictatorship, totalitarian regime, or any other country on
the planet, and in human history.
10.
“Mass incarceration on a scale almost unexampled in human history is a
fundamental fact of our country today,” writes the New Yorker’s Adam Gopnik. “Over all, there
are now more people under ‘correctional supervision’ in America - more than 6 million - than
were in the Gulag Archipelago under Stalin at its height.”
http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/22/zakaria-incarceration-nation/
11.
The U.S. has 760 prisoners per 100,000 citizens. That’s not just many more than
in most other developed countries but seven to 10 times as many. Japan has 63 per 100,000,
Germany has 90, France has 96, South Korea has 97, and Britain - with a rate among the highest
- has 153. Id. Florida is a national leader in incarceration rates, exceeding the national average.
http://www.project180reentry.org/statistics.html.
12.
Partly as a result, the money that states spend on prisons has risen at six times the
rate of spending on higher education in the past 20 years. For instance, in 2011, California spent
$9.6 billion on prisons vs. $5.7 billion on the UC system and state colleges. Since 1980,
California has built one college campus and 21 prisons. A college student costs the state $8,667
per year; a prisoner costs it $45,006 a year.
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http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2012/03/22/zakaria-incarceration-nation/.
13.
Similarly, Florida has over 102,000 inmates, and 150,000 inmates in community
supervision at a cost of over $2.3 billion,
http://www.dc.state.fl.us/pub/annual/1011/stats/im_pop.html, yet spends the least per capita of
any state in the nation on higher education. http://fcir.org/2012/03/08/in-florida-highereducation-treated-disdainfully/.
14.
The results are gruesome at every level. We are creating a vast prisoner under-
class in this country at huge expense, increasingly unable to function in normal society, all in the
name of a war we have already lost.
15.
The United States has the highest prison population rate in the world, 743 per
100,000 of the national population, followed by Rwanda (c. 595), Russia (568), Georgia (547),
U.S. Virgin Is. (539), Seychelles (507), St Kitts & Nevis (495), British Virgin Is. (468), Belize
(439), Dominica (431), Bermuda (428), Grenada (423) and Curacao (422), and Iran (333).
http://www.idcr.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/WPPL-9-22.pdf.
16.
With more than 2.3 million people locked up, the U.S. has the highest
incarceration rate in the world. One out of 100 American adults is behind bars – while a stunning
one out of 32 is on probation, parole or in prison. This reliance on mass incarceration has created
a thriving prison economy. The states and the federal government spend about $74 billion a year
on corrections, and nearly 800,000 people work in the industry.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/44762286.
17.
National and Florida politicians claim to love America, but the institutions they
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control cruelly abuse Americans with barbarism and disdainful treatment equivalent to a hate
that is far more cruel and destructive than the minor drug offenses and probation violations of
addicts that constitute most of these inmates. This Florida-based barbarism was inflicted upon
JACK P. KING.
18.
Since early June of 2010, JACK P. KING, who was then 66 (with both of his
parents having died of cancer) had months of severe pain in his thoracic rib cage that extended to
his spine. He was not able to sleep, and was able to eat very little. He was losing approximately
2 pounds of weight each week. As of August, he was down to 118 pounds and his normal
weight was above 140 pounds.
19.
Prior to June of 2010 and in the days and weeks that followed, JACK P. KING,
repeatedly requested a physical, a blood test, an X-Ray, and MRI, CAT scan, and physician to
diagnose and treat his condition. To which the DOC callously, intentionally and maliciously
refused to provide, and denied, diagnosis and treatment.
20.
In fact, decedent reported that that the nurses intentionally and maliciously do not
respond or care as to the condition and do not appear competent. Decedent also reported that the
medical staff view all inmates as manipulating the system and only treat these types of
complaints if an inmate collapses on the floor or is bleeding. Letters and Requests to DOC
Attached as Cumulative Exhibit B.
21.
Due to the deliberate indifference to clear medical needs, and callous and
intentional refusal to diagnose and treat, and failure to diagnose and treat, on August 23, 2010,
counsel for JACK P. KING, wrote to the DOC Secretary, Walter A. McNeil; DOC General
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Counsel, Kathleen Von Hoene, Esq.; U.S. Department of Justice Chief Special Litigation
Department, Civil Rights Division, Judy Preston, Esq.; Florida Attorney General, Bill
McCollum; and WCI Warden, Russell Hosford, providing written notice of this deliberate
indifference to clear medical needs and abject failure to diagnose and treat in violation of the
Eighth Amendment prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. Despite the clear urgency
and unequivocal written notice of barbarism and human abuse, not one state or federal
governmental official responded. Id., Copy of August 23, 2010 Letter Attached as part of
Cumulative Exhibit B.
22.
Prescient as to the Defendants’ inhumane lack of care and callous disregard to
human life, counsel for JACK P. KING, wrote:
Jack had a polyp removed in Lake Butler this past week since it was an external
malady, but his current condition was not addressed, and he will be sent back to
Crawfordville Correctional Institute, to start the medical treatment process all over
again. If ultimately cancer is found, the nearly three month delay in any effort
to diagnose or treat despite repeated requests indicates a severe lack of
civilized care that is resulting in the unnecessary sickness and death of Florida
inmates.
As counsel experienced in litigating Eighth Amendment violations, these facts
represent clear Eighth Amendment violations and significant liability to the
DOC. This is also an indication that this is a pattern taking place across the
entire DOC medical treatment process.
To avoid Jack’s untimely death, and to ensure no further violation of the Eighth
Amendment, this situation must be addressed promptly. Please let me know
what steps you are taking to ensure the civilized health care of Jack P. King, and
to ensure that he gets the diagnosis and treatment for his current condition.
Time is of the essence. Please respond to the Tallahassee Office listed above within
the next 5 days.
Id., (emphasis added). Again, absolute silence was the intentional, malicious, callous and
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inhumane response by these governmental and institutional leaders.
23.
Plaintiff had a 7.0 x 6.4 x 6.0 cm sclerotic yellow/white mass that almost
completely replaced the pancreas, and this mass infiltrated and perforated the posterior gastric
wall of the stomach and created a 4.0 x 2.0 x 1.2 cm stomach ulcer with tumor. Plaintiff had
metastatic disease in his peripancreatic lymph nodes, with numerous lymph nodes within the
mass being replaced by the cancer. Plaintiff also had liver cancer with a tumor. Exhibit A.
24.
Eleven (11) days later, on September 3, 2010, JACK P. KING, collapsed and fell
to the ground at WCI, hemorrhaging blood. WCI took vitals and blood samples for testing and
transferred JACK P. KING to Tallahassee Memorial Hospital. Immediately upon assessing
JACK P. KING, by a physician independent from the Defendant, DOC, on September 4, 12:40
am, as found in the TMH progress notes, diagnosed the following:
pancreatic mass & liver mets [metastatic] (presumed)
GI bleeding
Cachexia [loss of weight in response to malignant cancer growth]/wt loss
Coagulopathy [consistent with end stage liver disease]
Cumulative Exhibit C, Relevant Medical Records, Attached. (Emphasis added and relevance
inserted). Tomography report on JACK P. KING documented the same pancreatic mass, etc., on
September 4, 2012. Id. This diagnosis was obvious many months earlier, but despite his
constant pleas for diagnosis and treatment, governmental officials and the DOC and the WCI
callously and intentionally refused to diagnose and treat his condition, and no DOC or WCI
medical provider or physician would take the steps to diagnose and treat JACK P. KING.
25.
Sixteen (16) days from the August 23, 2010 Notice, see Cumulative Exhibit B,
JACK P. KING, died alone with strangers, without any support or comfort from anyone that
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knew him, four days later on September 8, 2010 at 10:55 am (having been informed at 10:30 am,
twenty-five minutes earlier, that his pancreatic cancer was terminal, that the vomiting of blood
and GI bleed could not be stopped and having consciously agreed to avoid extraordinary efforts
to keep him alive), due the Defendants callous refusal to diagnose and treat his cancer.
Cumulative Exhibit C. Consistent with this inhumane, intentional and malicious denial of
treatment and callous disregard for human life in violation of the evolving standards of decency,
JACK P. KING’s family members, who are lifetime residents of Tallahassee, Florida, and were
in the same city as the hospital where he died, were only contacted about his condition and
hospitalization after his death, and suffered substantial shock, mental and emotional anguish.
COUNT I
VIOLATION OF THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION 8th AMENDMENT’S
CRUEL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT PROHIBITION
26.
Plaintiff hereby asserts and re-alleges paragraphs 1 through 25 above and
incorporates the same herein in support of this Count.
27.
In order to state a cognizable claim for violation of the 8th Amendment’s cruel and
unusual punishment prohibition for failure to diagnose and treat a medical condition, a prisoner
must allege acts or omissions sufficiently harmful to evidence deliberate indifference to serious
medical needs." Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. at 106. "When the need for treatment is obvious,
medical care which is so cursory as to amount to no treatment at all may amount to deliberate
indifference." Mandel v. Doe, 888 F.2d 783, 789 (11th Cir. 1989). "Indifference can be
manifested by prison doctors in taking the easier and less efficacious route in treating an inmate,"
and "medical care that is so grossly incompetent, inadequate, or excessive as to shock the
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conscience or to be intolerable to fundamental fairness violates the eighth amendment." Rogers
v. Evans, 792 F.2d 1052, 1058 (11th Cir. 1986). "Medical care so inappropriate as to evidence
intentional maltreatment or a refusal to provide essential care violates the eighth amendment. . . .
" Id.
28.
The facts in this case demonstrate the Defendant DOC’s abject, callous and
deliberate indifference to serious medical needs, so gross as to amount to intentional and
malicous barbarism, shocks the conscience and is a clear violation of the standards of found in a
civilized and decent society.
WHEREFORE Plaintiff, the Estate of JACK P. KING, hereby respectfully demands
judgment, and damages, including the costs of this action be entered against the Defendant DOC,
for it’s violation of the Eighth (8th) Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibition
against cruel and unusual punishment. Plaintiff requests a jury trial on all issues so triable, and
any and all remedies in equity that are appropriate for the Court to implement the judgments and
damages requested herein.
COUNT II
VIOLATION OF ARTICLE I, SECTION 17, OF THE FLORIDA CONSTITUTION’S
CRUEL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT PROHIBITION
29.
Plaintiff hereby asserts and re-alleges paragraphs 1 through 25 above and
incorporates the same herein in support of this Count.
30.
In order to state a cognizable claim for violation of the Florida Constitution,
Article I, section 17, cruel and unusual punishment prohibition for failure to diagnose and treat a
medical condition, which follows the U.S. Constitution standards under the 8th
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Amendment, a prisoner must allege acts or omissions sufficiently harmful to evidence deliberate
indifference to serious medical needs." Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. at 106. "When the need for
treatment is obvious, medical care which is so cursory as to amount to no treatment at all may
amount to deliberate indifference." Mandel v. Doe, 888 F.2d 783, 789 (11th Cir. 1989).
"Indifference can be manifested by prison doctors in taking the easier and less efficacious route
in treating an inmate," and "medical care that is so grossly incompetent, inadequate, or excessive
as to shock the conscience or to be intolerable to fundamental fairness violates the eighth
amendment." Rogers v. Evans, 792 F.2d 1052, 1058 (11th Cir. 1986). "Medical care so
inappropriate as to evidence intentional maltreatment or a refusal to provide essential care
violates the eighth amendment. . . . " Id.
31.
The facts in this case demonstrate the Defendant DOC’s abject, callous and
deliberate indifference to serious medical needs, so gross as to amount to barbarism, shocks the
conscience and is a clear violation of the standards of found in a civilized and decent society.
WHEREFORE Plaintiff, the Estate of JACK P. KING, hereby respectfully demands
judgment, and damages, including the costs of this action be entered against the Defendant DOC,
for it’s violation of Article I, section 17, of the Florida Constitution prohibition against cruel and
unusual punishment. Plaintiff requests a jury trial on all issues so triable, and any and all
remedies in equity that are appropriate for the Court to implement the judgments and damages
requested herein.
COUNT III
RESERVATION OF RIGHTS FOR MEDICAL MALPRACTICE CLAIM
32.
Plaintiff hereby asserts and re-alleges paragraphs 1 through 25 above and
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incorporates the same herein in support of this Count.
33.
Defendants, Medical Providers for the DOC, failed to comply with the generally
accepted standards of medical care and treatment, in their callous, intentional and malicious
refusal and failure to diagnose and treat Plaintiff.
34.
Upon completion of presuit notice and discovery, as well as the facts currently
provided, the facts will demonstrate medical malpractice in violation of the generally accepted
standards of medical care and treatment.
WHEREFORE Plaintiff, the Estate of JACK P. KING, will then respectfully demands
judgment, damages and the costs of this action be entered against the Defendant DOC medical
providers for their callous refusal and failure to provide diagnosis and treatment consistent with
generally accepted standards of medical care and treatment. Plaintiff requests a
jury trial on all issues so triable, and any and all remedies in equity that are appropriate for the
Court to implement the judgments and damages requested herein. Plaintiff reserves the right to
assert a claim for medical malpractice and punitive damages upon satisfying the applicable
statutory prerequisites.
Respectfully submitted on this 3rd day of July, 2012.
TIM HOWARD
________________________
Tim Howard, Esq., Ph.D.
Howard & Associates, P.A.
Florida Bar No.: 0655325
8511 Bull Headley Road, Suite 405
Tallahassee, FL 32312
(850) 298-4455 (o)
tim@howardjustice.com
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