Disabled sex offender allowed to sue Indiana sheriff

A federal lawsuit brought against the Tippecanoe County Sheriff's Office last year by a disabled inmate will proceed toward trial, thanks to a judge's green light earlier this month.

Anthony Scott Overla, a convicted sex offender whose right leg is amputated below the knee, was assigned a top bunk in Tippecanoe County Jail, according to a civil complaint filed by the American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana.

Despite officers and medical staff in the jail being made aware that Overla uses a prosthetic leg, they failed to meet the inmate's repeated requests for a bottom bunk and chair to use in the shower, the suit alleges.

As a result, he sustained an injury March 31, 2013, jumping from the top bunk, which wasn't equipped with a ladder, according to the suit.

"I have a liner and a gel pack that goes on my leg. There is a pin in there that ruptured my stump and snapped in two pieces," Overla said during a Jan. 8 hearing in the U.S. District Court of Northern Indiana, according to an official court transcript made public this week.

Overla said he made at least 30 oral complaints and repeatedly requested — but never received — grievance forms to seek medical treatment for his broken prosthesis and leg, which later developed a bacterial infection.

Multiple jail officers failed to log Overla's complaints, the suit alleges.

"Some of them told me it wasn't grievable. Some of them told me they would get back to me. Some of them told me they would talk to a sergeant. And some didn't say anything," Overla said, according to the transcript.

Kelly Eskew, one of two ACLU staff attorneys representing Overla, said Tuesday that her client went seven months before receiving adequate medical attention — after he was transferred to the Indiana Department of Correction.

"And that's just unconscionable," she said.

Federal law stipulates that an inmate cannot bring a claim in court against a jail unless and until he or she has exhausted the facility's internal grievance process.

Eskew said the law is designed "to create a hurdle" between inmates and the court.

"But sometimes it just prevents lawsuits," she said.

Well aware of that hurdle, Eskew and fellow attorney Ken Falk spent months preparing for the Jan. 8 hearing, at which they argued that Overla had exhausted every step of the grievance process available to him.

Doug Masson, who has represented the Tippecanoe County Sheriff's Office more than a decade, countered the ACLU's claims. He called six witnesses during the hearing, including former Sheriff Tracy Brown and jail administrator Capt. Denise Saxton.

Masson argued that Overla is ineligible to proceed with the lawsuit because he failed to exhaust all administrative remedies available at the jail.

Saxton, three officers and the jail nurse testified that they had no record of any complaints from Overla, although they all admitted it's possible some complaints weren't logged properly.

Eskew said the jail's complaint process fell apart in practice, causing her client to suffer significant harm.

"They have a written grievance process, and it was not followed," she said. "Every jail officer that we deposed ... had a different understanding of how that process worked, and they implemented it differently."

U.S. District Judge Joseph Van Bokkelen found that Overla had presumptively done everything he could to complain about his living conditions, even though additional options spelled out in the jail's policy book remained beyond his reach.

"A 'dose of common sense' leads the Court to conclude that (Overla) was mislead on the grievance process, the jail personnel have a poor understanding of the Jail's grievance procedure, and (Overla) exhausted all of the remedies available to him," the judge wrote Feb. 20.

It would be unreasonable to assume that Overla remained silent about his injury for months on end, Bokkelen added.

"It is much more plausible," he wrote, "to infer that (Overla) was continually misled on the grievance procedure by jail staff, either purposely or inadvertently, which frustrated his efforts to exhaust his administrative remedies."

Bokkelen clarified his order April 2 in response to a request from Masson to reconsider.

The decision means Overla and the ACLU have permission to continue pressing for damages.

"The fact that he's cleared this hurdle now puts him on even footing with someone who's not in jail who's filed a lawsuit," Masson said Tuesday.

Moving forward with the discovery process, Masson said, the focus will shift from the grievance process to the allegations Overla raises.

"Once we've conducted discovery on those substantive issues, we'll see if we have grounds to move for summary judgment on any or all of his claims," Masson said.

Eskew said Overla's case raises several significant constitutional issues and involves alleged violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act and deliberate indifference to an inmate's medical needs.

Although the ACLU isn't seeking injunctive relief in this case, the organization does hope to improve medical conditions and the grievance process inside Tippecanoe County Jail, she added.

The parties have until early 2016 to complete the discovery process, Masson said, noting that he's offered some advice to jail staff in the meantime.

"My recommendation has been to emphasize keeping even more meticulous records because it makes it even easier to respond to these sorts of cases," he said.

Overla was incarcerated at the time of his alleged injury for failing to register as a convicted sex offender. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to six years with the Indiana Department of Correction, where he remains in custody.

His earliest possible release date is in September.

Overla, 29, was 15 years old in 2000 when he was adjudicated a delinquent child for criminal sexual abuse in Macon County, Illinois, according to Tippecanoe Superior Court 1 records.

He was ordered to register as a sex offender for 10 years but failed to do so in 2006, 2009 and 2013, court records state.

He was sentenced to a stint in prison for each conviction, and his decade on the sex offender registry started over each time he was released.