Lawsuit: Allegheny County Jail staff beat, restrained women inmates

Three women formerly incarcerated at the Allegheny County Jail filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against the facility and several officers alleging that they were “brutally assaulted” by a sergeant, who beat them, and improperly used a restraint chair and pepper spray on them.

The purpose of the lawsuit, filed by the Abolitionist Law Center, it said, is to “shine a light on the inhumane treatment endured by people incarcerated in Allegheny County.” It alleges that the jail’s staff uses force on inmates at a higher rate than other facilities across Pennsylvania — accounting for 15% of the state-wide total.

A county spokeswoman said she could not comment on pending litigation.

The Abolitionist Law Center filed another federal, class-action lawsuit against the jail in September alleging a gross failure to care for the mentally ill, including excessive use of solitary confinement.

Tuesday’s complaint, filed by April Walker, 27, La Vonna Dorsey and Alexus Diggs, accuses Sgt. John Raible of repeatedly assaulting the women, using Tasers and pepper, spray on them, and in some instances, stripping them naked before using the spray.

All three of the women, the lawsuit said, have psychiatric and physical disabilities that were exacerbated by Raible’s actions.

The complaint also names as defendants Allegheny County; Warden Orlando Harper; Chief Deputy Warden David Zetwo; Deputy Warden Jason Beasom and Capt. Jamie Merlino, who it said were Raible’s supervisors. It claims that the supervisors at the jail knew of Raible’s “proclivity” to use excessive force and did nothing to stop him.

The lawsuit, which provides extensive details on incidents that occurred between Raible and each plaintiff, said that the ACJ’s annual use of force by correctional officers has gone from 414 in 2015 to 720 in 2019.

In 2019, the complaint continued, that rate was double that of all other jails in Pennsylvania on a per capita basis.

Further, that same year, the complaint said, jail officers used a restraint chair 339 times — or more than twice that of the county with the second highest number of instances. The Allegheny County Jail, too, the lawsuit continued, had the highest number of Taser and stun gun use — nearly five times that of the second highest county. In 2019, it said, corrections officers used Tasers 146 times — accounting for 50% of all taser use in every jail in Pennsylvania.

The restraint chair includes officers immobilizing a person, strapping their shoulders, arms and legs to the chairs and sometimes covering their head with a spit mask. The lawsuit alleges that the chairs are often used without any mental health or medical oversight and sometimes for as long as eight hours without food, water, medication or bathroom breaks.

The lawsuit accuses jail staff of “gratuitous use” of the restraint chair “for nearly any issue, following a use of force incident; in lieu of mental health care for someone experiencing thoughts of self-harm; in response to an attempt at self-harm; as a consequence for non-compliance with an order; and sometimes for no identifiable reason at all, in a purely punitive and vindictive manner.”

The plaintiffs also accuse jail’s supervisors of condoning “virtually all uses of force by officers,” saying that they are rarely, if ever, disciplined for it, and that they fail to properly investigate allegations of physical abuse.

While the complaint specifically identifies Raible as having assaulted the women, it also notes that he is not “an outlier.”

“[R]ather he is an example of the systemic abuse” allowed to occur there.

According to the complaint, Raible was hired as a correctional officer at the jail in 2009. He was assigned to oversee the women’s housing pods on level four, the women’s acute mental housing pod and also served part-time on the Special Emergency Response Team.

The lawsuit accuses Raible of using pepper spray on inmates often without provocation, or when they were not a threat — like woman who refused to clean her cell or another who he suspected had drugs. It also claims he repeated Tased a woman with psychiatric disabilities because she refused to take her medications.

Specifically with regard to the plaintiffs, the complaint goes into detail about each incident.

Walker has asthma, bipolar disorder, anxiety, depression and PTSD, according to the lawsuit. Raible assaulted her at least twice, the lawsuit said.

In the first incident, the complaint said, Walker was two months pregnant and required hospitalization after she claims Raible repeatedly sprayed her with pepper spray and slammed her face into the floor.

About a year later, the lawsuit continued, Raible slammed Walker’s face into a concrete wall and then put her in a restraint chair “in response to her non-threatening conduct arising from a depressive episode.”

Dorsey, 35, too, has asthma, as well as severe anxiety, depression and PTSD.

Raible, the lawsuit said, repeatedly sprayed Dorsey’s naked body with pepper spray while she was locked in a strip cage and caused her severe injuries. Raible then, it continued, strapped Dorsey into a restraint chair.

Diggs, 25, has bipolar disorder, depression, anxiety and complex PTSD, the lawsuit said. She was held on the acute mental health pod, it continued, and was locked in an enclosed steel strip cage and shot with multiple pepper spray pellets because she allegedly had a flexible pen.

Raible, along with other officers, then strapped Diggs in a restraint chair without allowing her first to be decontaminated, resulting in her skin burning for several hours.

“As a consequence of supervisory defendants’ lack of policies and training on use of force with respect to people with psychiatric disabilities, officers routinely and wantonly seek to enforce compliance through brutal assaults,” the lawsuit said.

Policy at the jail requires Harper to receive a monthly report summarizing all complaints and appeals to “ascertain patterns and problem areas” in the jail “and to facilitate intervention in those areas,” the lawsuit said. The plaintiffs contend that there have been dozens of grievances and then appeals concerning Raible and other corrections officers for using excessive force, but despite those none of the jail’s supervisors took any actions to address them.