The deaths of two jail inmates -- one in Miami-Dade, the other in Tampa -- have officials investigating how the system failed to protect them. In the first, Joaquin Cairo was arrested on a misdemeanor and booked into the psychiatric ward of the Miami-Dade jail, where his cell-made allegedly threw him against the furniture, according to the Miami Herald; Cairo died a week later during surgery. U.S. Department of Justice officials have been overseeing the Miami-Dade Corrections Department’s facilities because of the shoddy care mentally ill inmates have received.
In the previously reported death of a Tampa man who was taken to jail instead of a hospital after suffering a stroke, the Florida Department of Health is investigating whether licensed health professionals failed to do their jobs, the Tampa Bay Times reports.
