HOUSTON – A man who was recently detained at the Harris County Jail claims that employees at the facility assaulted him.
Houston resident Jerome Bartee, Jr. sued the county on Oct. 3 in the Houston Division of the Southern District of Texas, alleging he asked to be treated for a “severe” toothache only for a group of jailers to beat him unprovoked last Sept. 4.
Bartee was brought to the jail following a traffic stop that yielded a controlled substance and a firearm. The plaintiff, 28, says the event in question left him bloodied and unconscious.
Per the suit, the jail’s newly installed, $5 million, high-definition surveillance video cameras recorded the beating and a county employee attempted to shut them off.
After Bartee was seen at Ben Taub Hospital, the original petition says, he was returned to the jail population. The district attorney’s office purportedly filed charges against the complainant for assaulting a public servant; the charges were later dropped for lack of evidence.
Bartee was released on Sept. 7. He underwent surgery to repair the fractures in his nose and to have a metal plate implanted in place of the badly fractured left orbit late last month.
The suit further asserts that the plaintiff also suffered mental and emotional distress.
Consequently, he seeks unspecified monetary damages.
Attorney Donald H. Kidd of the law firm Perdue & Kidd in Houston is representing Bartee.
Houston Division of the Southern District of Texas Case No. 4:16-CV-2944