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DuPage County is going to pay $11 million to the family of an Addison woman who died in the county jail to settle a lawsuit that claims jail medical personnel and corrections officers did not provide adequate medical and mental health care.
Reneyda Aguilar-Hurtado, 50, died on June 12, 2023, after being found unresponsive in her cell.
Aguilar-Hurtado’s adult daughter and teenage son then sued DuPage County Sheriff James Mendrick, two registered nurses, a licensed practical nurse, a psychiatrist, a medical doctor and six sheriff’s deputies.
A federal judge approved the settlement of the lawsuit on Feb. 13, according to court records.
“This was a horrific tragedy and an example of a perfect storm of failures,” DuPage County Board Chair Deborah Conroy said on Tuesday. “Too often, people like Mrs. Hurtado wind up being incarcerated. Too often, there are long waits for the few beds in publicly funded hospitals to accept people who need mental health treatment. And too often, mental health crises lead to physical crises that become life-threatening.”
Mendrick has not replied to a request for comment.
Michael Mead, attorney for the family, said they did not want to speak about the settlement.
How she died
According to the lawsuit, a DuPage County medical examiner ruled Aguilar-Hurtado died of multiple organ failure due to “failure to thrive due to a psychotic disorder.”
Aguilar-Hurtado was arrested in March 2023 on a misdemeanor battery charge, according to the lawsuit. Aguilar-Hurtado had schizophrenia. She was determined to be mentally unfit to stand trial, and on April 20, 2023, a judge ordered she be sent to a state mental health hospital for treatment.
But for reasons not spelled out in the lawsuit, the state never took custody of Aguilar-Hurtado.
The lawsuit charged that nurses, a medical doctor, a psychiatrist and corrections officers did nothing medically to help Aguilar-Hurtado, even after seeing vomit containing blood; bleeding from her mouth; her being found several times sitting in her own blood, feces and vomit; her having sacks of uneaten lunches in her cell; and her refusing to eat or take psychotropic medications.
A medical doctor, on admitting Aguilar-Hurtado, noted that she was easily agitated, had hallucinations, and spoke of seeing a skull in a toilet.
It took six weeks for a psychiatrist to see her.
The jail weighed her weekly. She lost 60 pounds, according to the lawsuit, and by June was too weak to walk on her own.
Her daughter complained to jail officials her mother appeared dehydrated and asked them to give her some water, but officials refused, according to the lawsuit. The medical examiner said Aguilar-Hurtado was dehydrated.
County response
Conroy on Tuesday highlighted the county’s crisis recovery center that is being built and expected to open late this summer.
The center will act as a behavioral health triage center where those experiencing mental health or substance abuse crises can be assessed and offered a plan of care within 24 hours. However, it will not provide long-term patient care.
She said the “responsibility to make and enforce any change” at the jail to ensure inmates are receiving proper care rests with the sheriff.
“In a situation such as this, it is reasonable for us, as elected officials, to expect that the sheriff has undertaken a painstaking review of events and policies and enacted new policies so that such a tragedy does not occur again,” she said.
“Moving forward, I hope the sheriff will do his part to maintain safety in the jail and provide the appropriate necessary medical and mental health services to those in his care,” she added.
• Daily Herald correspondent Alicia Fabbre contributed to this report.
https://www.dailyherald.com/20250311/news/dupage-county-to-pay-11-million-to-settle-lawsuit-over-detainees-death-in-jail/