$750,000 Paid by NaphCare for New York Jail Suicide
by Chuck Sharman
After a spate of deaths at the Onondaga County Justice Center (OCJC), the New York Attorney General’s office found the jail’s private medical contractor, NaphCare, Inc., in violation of state medical licensing laws, leading to an $875,000 fine and a five-year ban on practicing in the state, as reported elsewhere in this issue. [See: PLN, May 2026, p.28.] A lawsuit filed after one of those deaths also resulted in a $750,000 settlement in February 2025, with the County paying $100,000 and the balance paid by NaphCare and its subsidiary, Proactive Healthcare Medicine PLLC.
Proactive held the contract to provide medical and mental health care at OCJC on September 1, 2021, when Angela P. Cheng, 27, was booked on a probation violation charge. As recalled in the complaint later filed on her behalf, Cheng was a “restaurant worker and recovering heroin and alcohol addict with a history of suicide attempts”—a history which was “well known” to Defendant jail and Proactive officials because supervision had been transferred to the County for her three-year probated DWI sentence. Yet Cheng never received any medical, mental health or suicide screening at the jail.
On September 2, jailers found Cheng “lethargic and non-verbal” on the floor of her cell, “covered in vomit and feces.” They told emergency responders who transported her to a hospital that Cheng had a “history of chronic Fentanyl and Meth use” and had been displaying her symptoms “for approximately five (5) hours.” She was returned the following morning after hospital staff completed an evaluation. But during her absence jailers had found a burst balloon and buprenorphine pills in her cell, evidence that she was high on smuggled drugs. Rather than providing treatment while she detoxed, however, they wrote her up for a disciplinary infraction and tossed her into an unmonitored isolation cell.
Unsurprisingly, Cheng was observed and overheard vomiting into her cell toilet on the afternoon of September 3. Callous jailers waited 10 minutes to summon medical staffers, who took another two minutes to arrive. Meanwhile, Cheng hanged herself with a bed sheet. When medical staffers finally arrived, they began life-saving measures until emergency responders returned and transported Cheng back to the hospital. She died there three days later.
With the aid of attorneys Michael P. Kenny and Heidi M. P. Hysell of Kenny & Kenny PLLC in Syracuse, Cheng’s mother, Lori Reynolds, filed suit on behalf of her daughter’s Estate in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of New York in November 2022. Proceeding under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, Reynolds accused County and Proactive officials of deliberate indifference to her daughter’s serious medical need, in violation of her Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. She also lodged state-law wrongful death claims.
NaphCare moved to dismiss the Estate’s claims, arguing that it provided only management services to OCJC for medical care that was Proactive’s responsibility. But the district court denied that motion on August 14, 2023, finding not much daylight between the two corporate entities. Therefore, it was “plausible that NaphCare’s and/or Proactive’s employees’ alleged failures during the intake process … and their alleged failure to ‘place [Peng] on constant watch and monitor her with reasonable care’ following her return from [the hospital] … substantially contributed to Peng’s death.” See: Reynolds v. Cty. of Onondaga, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 141102 (N.D.N.Y.).
The parties then proceeded to reach their settlement agreement. Under its terms, NaphCare paid $650,000 and the County paid the rest of the $750,000 total, which included $235,620.55 in fees and $43,067.67 in costs for Plaintiff’s attorneys. The balance of $471,311.78 was placed in escrow pending resolution of Plaintiff’s action in Onondaga County Surrogate’s Court. To her enormous credit, Chief Judge Brenda K. Sannes denied NaphCare’s motion to seal the settlement. See: Reynolds v. Cty. of Onondaga, USDC (N.D.N.Y.), Case No. 5:22-cv-01165.
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Related legal case
Reynolds v. Cty. of Onondaga
| Year | 2022 |
|---|---|
| Cite | USDC (N.D.N.Y.), Case No. 5:22-cv-01165 |
| Level | District Court |