The Virginia Department of Corrections, under scrutiny over the death of an inmate that raised broader questions about conditions at a southwest Virginia prison, is refusing to release public records documenting inmate complaints about the facility.
Colleen Maxwell, who handles public records requests for the department, said in an email Wednesday that she had identified 46 pages of responsive records. But the agency invoked an exemption in the state’s open records law that deals with “records of persons imprisoned in penal institutions” to withhold the documents.
The lawsuit filed against five correctional officers alleges that Givens, who was intellectually disabled, was “sadistically tortured” and beaten in an off-camera shower area of the facility before being found unresponsive in his cell on Feb. 5, 2022. In the year before his death, Givens was taken to a hospital emergency room multiple times for hypothermia treatment, according to the lawsuit and medical records reviewed by AP.
In response to the grand jury’s findings, he said that department facilities are regularly inspected by a range of groups and agencies. According to the lawsuit, Givens had been incarcerated at Marion since shortly after he pleaded guilty to two felonies in connection with the fatal 2010 shooting of Misty Leann Garrett. She was employed as a home health nurse for Givens’ mother, according to local news accounts.
The correctional officers named as defendants in the lawsuit have denied the allegations in their answer to the complaint, and none have been charged with a crime.
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