Whether or not a federal lawsuit stemming from the death of a severely diabetic 20-year-old in the Bi-State Justice Building jail should go forward is the subject of several court filings made last week in Texarkana.
Morgan Angerbauer was being held in the jail for administrative violations of probation when she died of diabetic ketoacidosis in the early hours of July 1, 2016. Since her death, former Licensed Vocational Nurse Brittany Johnson has pleaded guilty to misdemeanor negligent homicide and been sentenced to a six-month county jail term.
Angerbauer's mother, Jennifer Houser of Texarkana, filed a civil suit in the Texarkana Division of the Eastern District of Texas seeking damages from LaSalle Corrections, the company that manages the jail, with the help of Little Rock lawyer Matthew Campbell in 2016. Campbell removed Houser as Angerbauer's estate administrator in May 2017 and substituted Little Rock lawyer Victoria Leigh in her stead without Houser's knowledge.
When Houser learned of Campbell's and Leigh's plan to settle the suit for $200,000 late last year, she objected to the proposal with the help of Texarkana lawyer David Carter. Miller County Circuit Judge Carlton Jones, who has authority over the probate case, at first denied Houser's attempt to object and approved the $200,000 settlement at a hearing in December.
But at a hearing in March originally scheduled to approve a distribution of the proposed $200,000 settlement, Jones withdrew his prior approval. At the hearing, Campbell agreed to step out of the federal case and allow Carter to take over as long as Campbell will still receive a 40 percent share of $200,000 when the case is finally resolved.
Earlier this month, Carter filed a motion in the federal case asking U.S. District Judge Robert Schroeder III to deny a motion to dismiss filed by LaSalle in anticipation of the $200,000 settlement. Carter's motion seeks an order from the court establishing new deadlines for procedures including the exchange of information, the designation of expert witnesses and amending court filings.
"At the time the parties negotiated the 'settlement' in November of 2017, plaintiff had not designated any expert witnesses, including experts to rebut the reports of defendant's experts. The undersigned intends to secure expert witnesses to address several issues, including causation. Plaintiff also intends to amend her complaint to revise her claims, potentially add new parties, and clarify the capacities in which some defendants are sued," Carter's motion states.
Texarkana lawyer Paul Miller filed a response to Carter's motion April 10 asking the court to deny Carter's motion for a new scheduling order in which he describes the request as asking for a "complete do-over" and "nothing more than a request to start the litigation over so as to pursue a different strategy than the strategy pursued by the original attorney."
LaSalle's motion describes Angerbauer as a methamphetamine user who routinely required hospitalization to address her out-of-control diabetic symptoms. The motion laments that staff at the Bi-State were not privy to hospital records describing her at "high risk of mortality" due to her drug use and failure to manage her blood sugar, which the motion alleges was frequently at levels as high or higher than the level of 813 found at Angerbauer's autopsy.
"Records reflect that physicians pleaded with Morgan Angerbauer and her parents to be compliant with the blood sugar management and warned that she was severely damaging her health and was at risk for dying," the defense motion states.
LaSalle's motion argues that if Carter is allowed to designate experts at this time, it will give the plaintiff's an advantage in the case they aren't legally entitled to have and place the defense at a disadvantage the law is drafted to avoid.
Carter filed a response Friday to LaSalle's motion reurging his request that a new scheduling order be entered and that the case be allowed to move forward to trial.
Carter takes issue with the list of facts listed by Miller in the LaSalle motion.
"In keeping with their well documented lack of compassion, defendants argue that, because Morgan had a history of drug use and suffered from a serious medical condition, her Constitutional rights to basic medical care were somehow suspended," Carter's motion states. "Defendants seem to believe they could deny Morgan desperately needed medical treatment and then literally watch her die, lying bare-chested in her own vomit, without making any real attempt to save her."
Carter's motion includes a link to Bi-State jail surveillance video posted on the Gazette's website last year.
Schroeder has not ruled on any of the recently filed motions in Angerbauer's case and no hearings are currently scheduled.