$15 Million Settlement Reached in San Diego Jail Detainee’s Untreated Withdrawal Death
On September 13, 2024, nearly five years after a detainee died of untreated heroin withdrawal symptoms at San Diego County’s Las Colinas Detention Facility, a $15 million settlement agreement resolving a lawsuit brought by her estate was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California. Under its terms, the County agreed to pay $14 million, with another $1 million paid by Coast Correctional Medical Group (CCMG), the contractor providing medical personnel to the County jails.
As PLN reported, Elisa Serna, 24, told jailers and CCMG staff at her November 2019 intake that she was addicted to heroin. She fainted more than once, for which her abnormally low blood pressure was clearly the proximate cause. Yet CCMG didn’t investigate further. In fact, Dr. Frederike Von Lintig recorded in her notes that she thought Serna was faking her symptoms, repeatedly returning the detainee to her cell without examination or even taking her vital signs.
Jail surveillance video later captured CCMG Nurse Danalee Pascua standing outside Serna’s cell and watching the detainee bang her head against the wall. But rather than offer or summon help, the nurse simply walked away, and Serna was found dead an hour later. Pascua and Von Linting were both charged with involuntary manslaughter. But the nurse was acquitted, and the jury hung at the doctor’s trial, after which prosecutors dropped her charges. [See: PLN, May 2024, p.48.]
With the aid of attorneys from Iredale & Yoo APC in San Diego, a suit was filed in October 2020 by Douglas Gilliland, S.R.S., the court-appointed administrator of Serna’s estate, as well as her parents, Michael Serna and Paloma Serna, who acted as the detainee’s guardian. Proceeding under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, Plaintiffs accused the County, Sheriff William Gore and his jailers, as well as CCMG and its personnel, of violating Serna’s Fourteenth Amendment rights by their deliberate indifference to her serious medical need. The suit also included a state-law wrongful death claim.
The case proceeded through lengthy discovery, while the criminal charges played out against Pascua and Von Lintig. Two CCMG defendants were dismissed from the case in November 2023, when the district court determined that they were not “Doe” defendants included in the complaint and could only be added as new defendants—for which the statute of limitations had by then expired. Plaintiffs timely filed an appeal to that ruling at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
Meanwhile, the parties proceeded to a mandatory settlement conference in June 2024, producing an agreement the following month. Under its terms, both the County Defendants and CCMG agreed to pay Plaintiffs’ attorneys amounts that were redacted from the document placed on the docket. The payout also included undisclosed amounts for Serna’s husband, Brandon Honeycutt, and her minor child, “S.H.” See: Est. of Serna v. Cty. of San Diego, USDC (S.D. Cal.), Case No. 3:20-cv-02096. The Ninth Circuit also granted dismissal to the Estate’s pending appeal on January 14, 2025. See: Est. of Serna v. Cty. of San Diego, 2025 U.S. App. LEXIS 13537 (9th Cir.).
While she was not criminally charged, CCMG Dr. Carole Ann Gilmore lost her medical license after Serna’s death. A fellow doctor who reviewed the case testified to the Office of Administrative Hearings that Gilmore’s actions “constituted gross negligence because [Serna] was experiencing acute withdrawal and (Gilmore) was aware of that but failed to treat or manage the withdrawal at all.” The state medical board adopted the license revocation order, effective September 13, 2024.
Additional source: Times of San Diego
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Related legal case
Est. of Serna v. Cty. of San Diego
| Year | 2024 |
|---|---|
| Cite | USDC (S.D. Cal.), Case No. 3:20-cv-02096 |
| Level | District Court |
| Conclusion | Settlement |