An elderly Miami-Dade jail inmate was diagnosed with COVID-19. He died at the hospital
A elderly Miami jail inmate who had been diagnosed with COVID-19 has died in the hospital, authorities confirmed Monday.
Lawyers had for months been trying to get 77-year-old Nelson Martinez out of jail because of his age and health. He’d spent the past two weeks in custody at Kendall Regional Medical Center.
He is at least the second Miami-Dade County inmate to die after being diagnosed with COVID-19. In May, an inmate named Charles Hobbs died of COVID-19 and other health complications.
Martinez was awaiting trial on accusations he molested a 7-year-old child back in 2008. He was not arrested until December 2019, after the victim finally came forward, according to a Miami-Dade police report.
“I filed motions, emailed prosecutors , communicated with corrections, I did everything I could to get him out. When there was nothing else I could do, I begged,” said defense attorney Arnold Trevilla. “I truly believed he was innocent. Despite the accusations, he didn’t deserve to die like this; no one does. We are humans first. The system failed him.”
Authorities have not officially ruled that COVID-19 killed Martinez, who died early Monday. The Miami-Dade Medical Examiner’s Office is now investigating the case and will ultimately rule on a cause of death, a spokesman said Monday.
A spokesman for the Miami-Dade jail system did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Like correctional facilities across Florida and the United States, Miami-Dade has struggled to contain the viral outbreak. Prosecutors, defense lawyers and judges have succeeded in reducing the overall jail population, from about 4,000 to about 3,200, releasing inmates who pose less of a risk to public safety.
Florida state prisons have been hit even harder — more than 15,500 inmates have tested positive, and 89 have died because of complications of the virus.
Conditions at the Miami-Dade jails have been the subject of a lawsuit from a group of civil rights organizations.
A federal judge in April criticized conditions at the Metro West Detention Center, but declined to order the release of the inmates, instead ordering jailers to give soap, cleaning supplies and masks to inmates. The suit was filed by civil rights groups, the Dream Defenders, Advancement Project National Office, Community Justice Project and Civil Rights Corps, and GST LLP.
An appeals court later overturned the judge’s ruling. The litigation is still ongoing.
Martinez had last been housed at Metro West. According to court documents, he’d been placed on a list of “chronic care” inmates who might be at risk.
He was charged with sexual battery and lewd and lascivious conduct on a child. Before the pandemic, in January, a Miami-Dade judge refused to allow him out on bond after hearing testimony and reviewing evidence during a hearing.
In April, amid the pandemic, defense lawyer Trevilla filed an emergency motion asking the court to release him because he was at risk of catching COVID-19. Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Gina Beovides declined, and did not grant a hearing.
His family and lawyer learned of Martinez’s illness and hospitalization on Aug. 17, after a corrections attorney emailed Public Defender Carlos Martinez (who is not related) about the case. He forwarded the email to Trevilla.
Corrections attorney Patricia Cummings had also included the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office in that email on Aug. 14.
“This inmate is currently hospitalized as positive for COVID19. In April, a Motion for Released was denied. Understanding the serious nature of the charges, please review for possible release or monitored released for this inmate,” Cummings wrote.
The Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office, in a statement, said “it is unfortunate when anyone dies of the virus.”
But the office defended seeking to keep him behind bars, saying the judge kept Martinez jailed because he “was charged with a very dangerous sexual act on a child” and because his “only residence across the street from an elementary school.”
“The continued State Attorney’s Office involvement in the release of low-level, nonviolent individuals from jail has led to some of lowest inmate numbers in memory.”
