Salas case revealed trouble at detention center

Editor's note: This is the second in a two-part series about lawsuits filed against Curry County since 2005.

The Clovis News Journal spent more than a month filing public records requests, then digging through hundreds of court documents related to 22 lawsuits that county officials say their insurance carrier has settled for more than $1 million.

The Orlando Salas case, spotlighted in this report, spurred interest in researching the lawsuits when county officials on Feb. 28 acknowledged Salas had been paid $450,000 about 14 months earlier.

County Commission Chairman Wendell Bostwick said staff "didn't follow procedures and protocol, which exposed us to some liability issues," in the Salas case.

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When 15-year-old Orlando Salas arrived at Albuquerque's New Mexico Youth Diagnostic Development Center in May 2006, he was described as being psychotic. YDDC staff members said he told them he was hearing voices.

Soon, he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.

His state-assigned psychiatrist testified he believed the psychological damage was due to Salas' experiences at Curry County's juvenile detention center.

Salas said he had frequently been denied food, losing 50 pounds in his eight-month stay at the Clovis jail.

He said he'd been tied and handcuffed in a restraint chair for hours at a time. Once, on March 6-7, 2006, he was in the chair nine straight hours, soiling himself for lack of a bathroom break.

He said other teenage inmates were allowed to urinate on him while he was tied down.

Jail staff provided him with inhalants and allowed him to "huff" to keep himself occupied, he said.

State police and jail records confirmed at least some of the boy's allegations were valid.

Salas' attorney said his client's treatment was nothing short of torture. Curry County officials declined to challenge him at trial. They agreed to a $450,000 settlement at the recommendation of the county's insurance carrier.

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Salas arrived at Curry County Juvenile Detention Center in September 2005, hours after a 10-year-old Clovis boy was shot in the head and killed while sleeping. Police don't believe Salas was at the scene when Carlos Perez was shot, but say Salas' argument with Perez' older brother precipitated the slaying. Salas eventually pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit first-degree murder.

Two of Salas' brothers and a friend were all convicted in connection with the child's death. One more suspect, Noe Torres, is jailed in Mexico awaiting extradition and trial in Curry County.

Once incarcerated, jail officials say Salas was a constant source of problems. Dozens of incident reports accuse Salas of repeatedly cursing, disobeying officers' instructions and threatening staff and other juveniles locked inside the facility.

He would kick his cell door and shout for hours, they said. To the frustration of juvenile detention staff, Salas would often hang his arms out a small access door in his cell called the bean hole in defiance of rules.

He's also alleged to have frequently jammed an emergency buzzer in his cell.

In an incident in March 2006, Salas, upset over being taken off work duty, jammed the buzzer for more than 30 minutes, records show.

"He was ordered by (Administrator Lucy) DeLuna to go to his buzzer and push it again as it was stuck and he completely ignored her," a detention officer's report notes.

"It is now 1400 (hours) and the buzzer is still stuck and I asked him to get the button unstuck and he said he did not want to."

In response to problems Salas caused, staff sometimes brought out a restraint chair, trying to restore order in the jail.

The chair, manufactured by E.R.C. Inc. of Denison, Iowa, is a wheeled device that immobilizes violent inmates or inmates who present a danger to themselves. They are usually strapped to the chair at the wrists, ankles, waist and upper torso. Salas was handcuffed with his hands behind his back when placed in the chair, according to testimony of several detention officers.

Court records show Salas was not the only juvenile inmate subjected to the chair, isolation and other alleged punishment one state inspector referenced under oath as "a little disturbing."

Records show juveniles were threatened with tasers — electric shock weapons, which one expert witness testified was "unheard of" as a means of discipline.

Officials confirmed Salas was tased at least once when he became physical toward a detention officer.

Soon after Salas' allegations, the juvenile jail was issued a temporary certificate of operation for having improper restraint policies in effect, records show.

The head of New Mexico's Children, Youth and Families Department asked state police to investigate jail officials for child abuse. Police spent a month interviewing jail staff and combing through documents before handing over the case to District Attorney Matt Chandler.

Child abuse charges were not filed.

"After reviewing the complaint," Chandler said in an emailed response to CNJ questions about the case, "and seeking advice from additional prosecutors, it was a unanimous consensus that the allegations from the juvenile delinquent were either unfounded and/or failed to meet the criminal elements of child abuse, such as criminal intent or a reckless disregard for the safety of the child.

"The evidence presented to the District Attorney's Office was mixed with claims that the juvenile delinquent falsified claims, manipulated others and was consistently posing a safety risk to the staff and himself, which at times caused him to be placed in isolation or restraints."

Chandler said that while "it was questioned that policy may have been breached and possibly created a civil liability," he determined jail officials "were reacting to numerous threats and attempts to escape by the juvenile delinquent."

Chandler said Salas was tased in response to an "attack on an officer and a sheriff's deputy."

He also wrote in his email that Salas was arrested while serving time in the Albuquerque detention center "for biting a guard and then stabbing him three times in the head with a pencil. "I believe, in my opinion, these are the types of acts the staff (in Clovis) was attempting to avoid in 2006."

The Albuquerque charges were dismissed after Salas was found incompetent to stand trial, according to nmcourts.com.

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Salas claimed staff at Clovis' jail dismissed his complaints, but the intake staff at YDDC took them seriously.

Salas' allegations were passed on to Bruce Langston, director of the state Children, Youth and Families Department, the agency charged with annual inspections of state juvenile facilities. Langston sought the state police investigation.

Beginning in June 2006, state police Sgt. Monica Martinez, now assigned to the Roswell post, spent a month interviewing JDC staff and compiling evidence of possible child abuse.

While Martinez was able to confirm Salas was once restrained for nine hours, she found no evidence that other inmates urinated on Salas.

Matthew Coyte of Albuquerque, Salas' attorney, would later discover a guard's written account of that incident despite DeLuna and jail staff denying it ever happened.

Martinez declined an interview, saying her 100-page report speaks for itself.

In depositions of key juvenile jail staff, including DeLuna, all swore under oath they followed policy before forcing Salas and other teens into the restraint chair.

They said the policy required one of two nurses on staff to authorize use of the chair and the time limit was one hour.

Court records show both nurses denied knowing the chair was being used frequently.

Nurse Connie Belcher told Martinez she wasn't asked for permission to leave Salas in the chair for nine hours and she "never" would have authorized it.

Nurse Carol Holland told Martinez no one called her and "no one has ever" called her and "asked for nine hours."

Both nurses said they were shocked when Martinez showed them a jail log documenting Salas' nine hours in the chair.

Depositions show Coyte handed Holland a guard's incident report noting she had been called the night Salas was in the chair nine hours. The report showed Holland told the guard to "do whatever needed to be done."

But Holland denied making the statement.

"I never said that," records show Holland responded.

Coyte: "OK. Why do you say that?"

Holland: "Because I would say ... you know, because if they (juvenile inmates) had not calmed down within an hour I would have sent them to the emergency room to see what was going on."

Holland, Belcher and key staff involved in using the chair on Salas and others testified they had never seen a written policy on its use. Coyte said that was because there wasn't a written policy and use of the chair and tasers to scare the teens was hidden from state CYFD Inspector Karen Herrera by jail Administrator DeLuna.

Herrera testified she had inspected the jail in November 2005, January 2006 and November 2006. Not once, Herrera said, was she provided with a written policy on using the restraint chair or any incident reports involving deployment of a taser or using one to threaten the teens.

She said she learned of it for the first time in depositions when Coyte handed her copies of incident reports and Martinez's investigation.

"On a personal level," Herrera said under oath, "it's a little disturbing ... it's certainly something that I would want to explore further."

Herrera went on to say that if she had known such activities were taking place, she would have considered recommending Clovis' juvenile jail be closed. Shortly after her deposition, Herrera and the CYFD notified Curry County officials that use of the restraint chair and taser were a violation of state standards.

Threats of taser use were discovered by Coyte, who found a reference in an incident report filed at the Curry County Sheriff's Department.

On Oct. 3, 2005, deputies were summoned by jail staff and told specifically to bring a taser to help control a juvenile inmate (not Salas), the record shows. The boy was kicking at his cell door, spitting and cursing staff when deputies arrived.

After an officer pointed the taser at him, the teenager allowed deputies to cuff him and he was strapped into the restraint chair, the report shows.

The taser wasn't fired in that incident. But during depositions juvenile jail staff said Salas had been shocked once, perhaps even more times. They couldn't remember.

They said sheriff's deputies were sometimes asked to use a taser to either shock or threaten to shock unruly juvenile inmates.

A Clovis police officer called to the juvenile facility refused to use his taser, cautioning staff that it was a dangerous weapon and such a request was a violation of his training on how to use the gun, records show.

Anne Nelsen, a nationally recognized juvenile detention expert hired by Coyte and deemed an expert witness by the federal judge hearing the Salas case, called the jail's use of a taser "unheard of."

"It is simply not considered acceptable practice in juvenile detention to use tasers or the threat of using tasers to obtain compliance," Nelsen said.

County Manager Lance Pyle said all employees who were part of the litigation, including DeLuna, are no longer working for the county.

DeLuna did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Commission Chairman Wendell Bostwick said fixing problems at the jail, many attributed to poor training of staff, is the commission's No. 1 priority. He said he is confident new jail Administrator Gerry Billy has the background and ability to change the culture at the Clovis facility.