JONESBORO, Ark. – The on-duty nurse at the Craighead County Detention Center refused to send an inmate to the hospital on May 3 after multiple requests by jailers, because she said there was nothing the hospital could do for him when he was coming off the effects of narcotics, according to records released to NEA Report.
Brock Austin Tyner, the inmate who eventually was taken by an ambulance after the jailers insisted, was pronounced dead at the hospital early May 4, 2024.
The details were revealed in a records request made by NEA Report to the Craighead County Sheriff’s Office. Two incident reports, internal investigations, jail logs, video, and other records were all released as part of the records request.
It began the night before, at 10:55 PM on May 3, when a 911 caller reported Brock having a medical episode on Gee Street. EMS was dispatched along with officers from the Jonesboro Police Department. Officer Joseph Harris arrived on scene at 11:01 PM. Dispatch logs show EMS, which had been enroute, canceled by Officer Harris at 11:04 PM. Instead, Harris arrested Brock for public intoxication and transported him to the Craighead County Detention Center.
Brock’s mother, Alice Melton Taylor, told NEA Report this week she doesn’t understand why the officer would cancel the ambulance.
“My son asked for help and never received it,” Alice said. “It breaks my heart. I don’t understand how one human being can call off an ambulance and not take him to get help. I don’t understand this.”
Officers arrived with Brock at the jail. As previously reported video showed, Brock appeared to be experiencing the effects of an overdose. Detention officers requested the on-duty nurse to perform an exam before accepting the inmate. Nurse Delaney Hall performed the wellness check and decided he was in good enough shape to be booked into jail.
The reports say the inmate was combative and video does show him spastically moving and having difficulties controlling his movements. Corporal Joseph Minton decided to place Brock in an emergency restraint chair. Brock was locked in a search room where he continued to yell and struggle.
When using the emergency restraint chair, detention officers are required to keep a log and check the inmate every five minutes. After 60 minutes, detainees are supposed to be let out of the chair to use the restroom, walk around and move his or her arms – unless still actively combative, according to guidance printed on the emergency restraint chair log.
Brock was put in the restraint chair at 11:17 PM on May 3. The first hour’s log shows he was yelling and moaning for the first 30 minutes, and moaning for the second 30 minutes. At one point, he maneuvered himself upside down and had to be placed in a different restraint chair by detention officers.
At 12:22 AM, detention officers noted he was still moaning. But at 12:27 AM, jailers reported he had become quiet. Jailer Megan Ferguson wrote in her report that she checked Brock and noticed him slumped over with his eyes halfway open and bloodshot, breathing very heavy, and unresponsive. Ferguson reported she radioed for Nurse Hall, who came to booking and said his vitals were “fine.”
“She checked his blood pressure but only checked his pulse by placing her fingers about two inches under his ear,” Ferguson reported.
Ferguson told the nurse he did not look good and probably needed to go to the hospital but again, Hall told her his vitals were fine and left booking.
However, Ferguson acted on her concerns and went to the control pod to tell Corporal Minton she didn’t think the jail needed to keep Brock because he did not look like he was doing well. Minton said to have the nurse come back down to booking in about 20 minutes and if he wasn’t any better, to send him to the hospital.
At 12:47 AM, Ferguson checked on Brock again. She loosened his wrist restraints, which appeared to be too tight, and checked his pulse. His heart rate was very fast, she noted. At 12:55 PM, she returned to check on Brock. His pupils were extremely dilated and nothing seemed to be any better, the report said.
The jailer called Nurse Hall back into the search room to check him again, with Ferguson telling Hall that she thought he needed to be sent to the hospital. The report states Hall responded that his vitals were fine and that the hospital was not going to do much due to him coming down from something. Corporal Minton came to booking around this time and told the nurse they probably should send him to the hospital. The nurse finally stated, “We can send him to the hospital.”
At 1:00 AM, dispatch was called and an ambulance was sent to the jail.
At 1:11 AM, detention officers checked Brock again and found him without a pulse. Yet again, Nurse Hall was radioed to come back to booking to help. Jailers began chest compressions and at 1:15 AM, reported getting a pulse back. At the same time, Emerson Ambulance Service arrived. At about 1:31 AM, the ambulance departed and transported Brock to St. Bernards.
At 2:06 AM, Corporal Minton was informed that the hospital had pronounced Brock dead. A toxicology screening conducted at the hospital found methamphetamine, amphetamine, fentanyl, and THC in Brock’s system at the time of his death.
The tragic ending to a 21-year old’s life has left his mother grieving. As Alice explained to a reporter, she knew her son had problems, and had tried to help him, but to no avail.
“He was a twin,” Alice said. “I lost his twin a couple of months before I gave birth. And now I’ve lost my youngest son. And I don’t get it. All because somebody can’t do their damn job? I don’t get it. I’m not that type of person who can be that mean and vicious to somebody.“
Alice was grateful for the bystanders who called 911 and recorded video of Brock in medical distress before he was arrested. It showed how obvious it was that he needed help, she said, adding the two women who tried to save his life visited her and brought her flowers in the weeks after.
However, Alice is distraught over the lack of compassion she feels was shown to her son. She specifically asked why Officer Harris canceled the ambulance and why Nurse Hall repeatedly neglected to send Brock to the hospital.
Nurse Hall completed a report about the incident, which was included in the files obtained by NEA Report.
Brock’s parents were divorced at the time of his passing. The family is exploring legal options for a possible wrongful death lawsuit. However, nothing has been filed as of this report.
“All I ask for everybody is please, keep me in your prayers because that’s the only thing that’s keeping me going right now,” Alice said. “And keep Brock in your prayers. He deserved so much better. “
The nurse at the center of this incident has responded to this report. Click here to read.
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Medical Industry and Law Enforcement, I don’t know which is worse. Avoid falling into the hands of either.
The said nurse,should be charged with negligence homicide for acting as Doctor, Judge and Jury in spite of all the possible concerns of the inmates welfare given from authorities !
Sincerely,
Civil Rights
He made his choice by taking the illegal drugs. Why should we waste hard working taxpayer dollars on a junkie?
Surely this isn’t the actual Mayor Copenhaver
He wasn’t a “junkie” he was in crisis. Truly, I understand how easy it is to just be in that attitude, but I knew this kid, he was a good kid just having a mental breakdown, and got with the wrong crowd. He gave his heart to God a year before his death, but he was battling mental illness, and drug addiction. He wanted help. He never got it. Find some compassion for another person in your heart. I pray that your heart be softened and for you never to have to experience this pain, the one that is felt by his mother and father.
The said NURSE is the wife of the Jail Administrator, Mr. Hall…
Go figure…smh
Do we even have civil rights anymore? I had been dealing with negligence and wrongfully about my daughter the hospital did her so wrong and nothing happened yet my daughter was only 22 at the time and the doctor left some of the afterbirth in her and she was septic from it and now the doctor still delivering babies like he didn’t do nothing wrong but I know he didn’t do his job right and the emergency room didn’t even I have a story to tell but nobody wants to hear it so if you can direct me to somebody please
That poor young man! This is truly 💔 to see someone clearly in so much distress, and those heartless officers taking him to jail instead of the hospital. They absolutely should be held accountable for their actions. Protect and serve, my ass! Their authority goes to their egos. My mother was an officer, she NEVER would have treated anyone like that. My deepest sympathies to that young man and his family. God be with you
“poor young man”? He wasn’t poor to afford that smorgasborg of drugs.
This happens alot more then people know it is sad but true
Wonder if this is the same thing that happened to guy in Greene County Jail several months back. There has never been any info released on this and it has been a while. The guys last name was Clark.
The nurse on duty is the wife of the Jail Administrator…this should be thoroughly investigated
she is not the wife of the jail admin. Where are you people getting this bad information.? She isnt married to anybody that works at the jail
I feel for this mother and that the nurse played god when she had no right .the nurse should lose her job because she did not do it properly..if it was my son I would have her ass .INE NEVER KNOWS WHAT IA PERSON HAS TAKEN OR WHAT YOU GO THROUGH WHEN WITH DEAWING..UNKESS YOU HAVE BEEN IN THIS PREDICTION YOU JUST DONT K IW HIW IR WHAT IR US EVEN LIKE..ITS A HARD RHING FIR ANY NOTHER TO GO THROUGH .I NEVER KIST A CHILD BUT DID HAVE TO BRING IBE BA CK AND IF OTHER PEOPLE WOULD HAVE NOT BEEN THERE I WOULDN’T HAVE MY SON HERE TODAY . I AM VERY SORRY FOR THE LOSS IF SON FIR THUS MOTHER..
I JUST DON’T GET IT HELP USE TO BE ABUNDANCE NOWADAYS MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS DON’T SEEM TO CARE AS MUCH MY MOTHER WAS SUPPOSED TO BE TRANSFERRED TO ANOTHER HOSPITAL ABOUT 50 MILES AWAY BUT DIDN’T EVEN APEAR TO MAKE IT THERE.IY TOOK THE AMBULANCE SERVICE TO PICK HER UP 3 HOURS LATER EVEN THOUGH HER DOCTOR REQUESTED HER TO BE MOVED AT 10:AM INSTEAD OF GETTING TO HER DESTINY SHE’S DEAD IN THE BACK EMERGENCY ROOM..NO EXPLANATION NO APOLOGIES ONLY THAT SHE DIED. OMG WHAT HAS THIS WORLD COME TO.IM STILL FIGHTING FOR HER JUSTICE ,COMPENSATION, APOLOGIES EHAT REALLY HAPPENED, WHOSE TO BLAME AS NO ONE HAS COME FORTH WITH ANYTHING ELSE TO COMFORT HER FAMILY ONLY LIES AND STAGED STORIES.I WILL CONTINUE TO FIGHT THIS AWFUL BATTLE OF NEGLIGENCE IN A TERRIBLE WAY.. JUSTICE FOR MRS. KIMBLE 😭
Sorry, Sorry, Sorry all you guys are poor excuse in all of the Jails, and DOC too. Before the officers took the young man to jail. The guy had already said he did some drugs and he needed help…So officers y’all should have taken him to the hospital.. Soon as y’all were called.. Instead of taking him to jail. Jail is not a freaking health facility. It’s a place where they cage human beings and treat them like animals.These are real human beings that y’all are putting in jail.It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure things out. Do any of you officers and jailers have any kind of common since? If a human being is saying they need help. HELP THEM…You don’t take them to jail. Take them to a Hospital, Emergency Room, ETC. Where they know, they will be looked after… All y’all are fake. Jus working for fun. Jus to get a Dam paycheck. If your occupation is say who you are, and what you do. You need to think very hard before you take a job… Cause there’s a lot of fake human beings out there. That’s not doing their job. All y’all who work in Jail facilities and Other places.That mistreat human beings like they ain’t nothing. You stand around and watch a human being, fighting for their life, to sorry to get them the medical help. You watch, and watch them slowly die.. Instead of getting them to a hospital. How cruel could anyone be, to another human being… SO SO SAD, BUT IT’S TRUE.
When I worked as a nurse, it didn’t matter if the patient’s vitals were good, if I didn’t like the way they looked or acted. They were shipped out to the ER ASAP!
When in doubt, send them out!!