Deaths at the St. Louis city jail are higher than public safety officials have previously shared and higher than indicated in online monthly public safety reports, according to new information from the city’s Department of Public Safety.
The man that died in the City Justice Center on Nov. 9 became the 18th person who has died in custody at the city jail since 2020, the department reported to St. Louis Public Radio through the mayor’s office last week.
The unidentified man was incarcerated at the city jail. The cause of death remains under investigation.
“Our priority is to complete the investigation, continue to update the family, and respect their privacy,” said Conner Kerrigan, a spokesman for St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones’ office in a statement. “We will share additional information as appropriate once it becomes available.”
The mayor’s office said the chairs of the Detention Facilities Oversight Board and the Board of Aldermen Public Safety Committee were informed of the incident.
Rasheen Aldridge Jr., 14th Ward alderman and vice chair of the board’s Public Safety Committee, said no one should die while in custody. The six-story CJC building can hold at least 860 detainees.
“To hear about another death in the jail is definitely alarming and problematic, and it's unfortunate because I’ve always said jail is a place that is not to be of luxury, of course, but it's also not a place that should be inhumane,” Aldridge said. “The jail facility mainly houses low-level offenders ... who ran a red light, a stop sign or have a traffic ticket, or [for] child support."
“We have all made mistakes, and they will have a due process,” Aldridge said. “Anytime somebody dies on the city hand is unfortunate.”
Aldridge commended St. Louis Director of Health Dr. Mati Hlatshwayo Davis for her intentionality and care for detainees after the department began providing medical oversight for the jail nearly a year ago. Mayor Jones appointed Hlatshwayo Davis to lead the city’s health department in 2021.
Deaths at the CJC so far this year are the lowest they’ve been since 2021.
The latest information from the public safety department shows four deaths at the city jail in 2020; one death in 2021; six deaths in 2022; five deaths in 2023; and two deaths so far this year.
CJC compared
On the other side of Missouri, the Jackson County Detention Center and Regional Correction Center in Kansas City has seen a third of the number of deaths as have occurred at the CJC since 2020.
The Jackson County Sheriff’s Office reports that six deaths occurred at the jail facilities between 2020-2024. One person died by suicide. The other deaths were drug-related or due to health reasons.
Despite the gap in deaths, the St. Louis and Jackson County jails house similar amounts of incarerated people.
From 2020-2024, the Jackson County jail held roughly 750 detainees on any given day. St. Louis held an average of at least 660 detainees daily during that same timeframe, according to online data provided by the St. Louis corrections division. (St. Louis also operated another jail during that span called the Medium Security Institution or colloquilly, the Workhouse, which has not housed anyone since June 2022.)
Daily population at city jails is typically calculated by determining the average daily population, which is the total number of detainees housed in the jail each day over a specific period, divided by the number of days in that period, according to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics.
It’s calculated this way due to the constant movement of incarcerated people in and out of facilities.
Unreliable reports
The 18 people who have died while being detained at the St. Louis City Justice Center since 2020 are slightly more than what public safety officials shared earlier this year.
At a public safety town hall in January, St. Louis Public Safety Director Charles Coyle said 15 people in custody had died at the CJC since 2020.
“When we look at the deaths that have taken place at the Justice Center, and I’ve looked at each one of them, there was 15 from 2020,” Coyle said. “Believe me I looked at them.” The two additional deaths since his comments would bring his total to 17, one fewer than the latest figures provided by the city.
Coyle did not immediately respond to requests for comment last week about the discrepancy.
In February, Corrections Commissioner Jennifer Clemons-Abdullah at a St. Louis Board of Aldermen Public Safety Committee hearing said there had been 11 deaths at the jail since 2021, which was also short by one based on the latest insight from the Public Safety Department.
Deputy Jail Commissioner Tammy Ross is currently serving as acting commissioner of the city jail after Clemons-Abdullah went on leave in September for reasons that have not been disclosed publicly.
The public safety department's division of corrections posts monthly reports each year highlighting detainee population, deaths and other details.
The reports go back to 2017, but the online data contains inconsistencies and missing information regarding suicide and non-suicidal deaths, among other things.
For example, in the city’s online monthly reports for 2020, there were only two deaths reported at the City Justice Center that year. But based on the latest information, that’s only half the number of deaths that occurred at the city jail that year.
Zero deaths are shown in online reports for 2021 and 2022, and deaths were also underreported in 2023 — online reports show only three people died in jail custody that year.
In addition, the online monthly report for April 2018 is missing. The report for May 2018 appears to be duplicated in its place when one clicks on “Monthly Reports 2018.”
The issue of publicly available jail death data is not uncommon, however. According to Vera, a national group working to reform criminal and immigration systems, the U.S. Department of Justice requires that data be collected, but it does not have to be shared publicly. After independently gathering data from hundreds of sources, Reuters estimated that jail deaths had surged 35% nationally between 2009 and 2019 despite a decrease in jail population during that time.
Z Gorley, communications director for the legal advocacy organization ArchCity Defenders, said they are frustrated with the city’s lack of coherent information. Incarcerated people and their loved ones deserve better, they said.
“These are people who had families and lives, and the lack of humanity and confusion over the numbers is not a good look for St. Louis,” Gorley said.
Gorley said they submitted a public records request to the city’s corrections division earlier this year seeking individual names and dates of detainees deaths. After their request was delayed several times, the office pointed them to the city’s online monthly reports, Gorley said.
The problem is, those reports don’t contain information about specific death cases at the city jail. Gorley said they were confused as to why the division would point them in that direction.
The work must continue
The 22-year-old city jail has seen many complaints and uprisings against troubled conditions at the facility in recent years.
In 2022, people incarcerated at the City Justice Center filed a federal class-action lawsuit accusing guards of torturing them with mace and depriving them of water for days. They allege that guards maced detainees who were restrained in handcuffs and while they were in their cells.
Officials at ArchCity Defenders — one of the organizations representing the detainees — said last week the lawsuit is ongoing.
A corrections guard was injured in an August 2023 hostage-taking and a circuit judge issued an order in April that forced jail officials to allow detainees to speak to their attorneys. City aldermen followed up with legislation that made jail employees liable for fines and fees if they blocked attorney access to the jail.
“I think the facility and the overall operations is something we need to continue to look at, and [corrections officers] get paid very low,” Aldridge said. “So they may have less ability to care for inmates on top of the hard job [that they have].”
Aldridge expressed a desire to see outdoor recreation at the CJC and improvements to the lock system within the jail. He said he is cautiously optimistic about progress at the facility due to helpful oversight from the health department and a decline in deaths, but plans to continue to call for accountability.
"One death is too many, to be very clear,” Aldridge said.
He said the overall quality and stability of the jail needs to be improved, and that officials should look into how to make it stable for all people who come in, regardless of whether they’ve been using drugs or have had inadequate health care.
Nicole Grundmeier from the Midwest Newsroom contributed to this reporting.
