The Georgia sun scorched the slab of concrete beneath Juan Carlos Ramirez Bibiano’s body when nurses found him in a puddle of his own excrement, vomiting, according to a complaint.
Officers left Ramirez in an outdoor cell at Telfair State Prison on July 20, 2023, for five hours without water, shade or ice, even as the outside temperature climbed to 96 degrees by the afternoon, according to a lawsuit brought by his family. That evening, the complaint says, Ramirez died of heart and lung failure caused by heat exposure. He was 27.
Ramirez’s family, including his mother, Norma Bibiano, announced a lawsuit against the Georgia Department of Corrections on Thursday, alleging that officers’ negligent performance of their duties caused his death. The warden directed officers to check on inmates, bring them water and ice and limit their time outside, the complaint says.
The Department of Corrections reported that Ramirez died of natural causes, Jeff Filipovits, one of Norma Bibiano’s attorneys, said at a news conference in Decatur, a suburb of Atlanta.
That’s not even that hot, pretty wild you can die from whatever heat related issues he had in just 5 hours.
Pre-existing conditions maybe?
Go stand in that heat for 5 hours. Go ahead we will wait for you to report back on how easy it was to survive.
I mean, I’ve worked in agriculture pulling weeds in those temps and setting up irrigation lines. It was literally 30° F hotter in my job where I stand in front of the kitchen door a couple weeks ago. It’s a far cry from comfortable, especially if you don’t have access to water, but I can’t imagine dying from it, absent some other health condition that was aggravated by it.
Also, just to be clear, I absolutely think it’s abusive to leave an inmate in such conditions without access to water and shade, I’d just be surprised to hear it was fatal in an otherwise healthy young person.
The heat of a concrete cell is entirely incomparable to a wet field.
Lol, tell me you haven’t worked in agriculture without saying it. These are not wet fields, it was drip lines strung over pots with a black plastic tarp laid out underneath, so you get to enjoy the heat being reflected back up to you. Yet another liberal on the internet that wants to speak on behalf of people whose experiences they have no frame of reference for.
I want you to stand in a hot concrete cell in direct sun and try and compare that to a field.
But you can leave. That’s a big difference between the two. If you feel bad, you can just sit down for a rest. I’m sure you got lunch too.
I don’t know why you’re trying to say your job was the same as a prison cell.
We’re simply talking about the heat being about to kill you, not the conditions it was endured in or what is right or wrong.
Like the guy you replied to, I think it’s abusive to do that to an inmate. I’m just genuinely surprised 5 hours in the sun at 35° would kill you.