Inmate suicide at Erie County Prison leads to confidential settlements. What's hidden?

Update: This article has been revised to reflect that all the claims against one of the defendants, Amy Farris, D.O., were dismissed in a court order that was signed and filed on Sept. 27, five days after this story was originally published.

Matthew Creaton, a troubled 35-year-old from Cranesville, was under the public's care when he took his own life as an inmate at the Erie County Prison more than three years ago. Shielded from public view, however, are the financial ramifications of his death and the lawsuit that followed it.

A series of confidential settlement agreements has ended the federal case over Creaton's suicide.

Creaton's estate sued the contracted medical providers at the prison, claiming their negligence or "deliberate indifference" to Creaton's medical needs contributed to him to taking his own life by hanging himself with a towel in his cell on Feb. 19, 2020.

Creaton died eight days after he was sent to prison on a civil charge that he had failed to pay child support, according to court records. The lawsuit, among other things, claimed that the medical providers at the prison erred when they removed Creaton from suicide watch on Feb. 16, 2020 — three days before he killed himself.

The medical providers denied the claims and argued that they were not liable, according to court records.

Erie County and the Erie County Prison were not named as a defendants in the suit, filed in February 2022 in U.S. District Court in Erie. The plaintiff was Ashley Creaton, who is Matthew Creaton's sister and the administrator of his estate.

Confidentiality listed as 'key aspect' of settlements

The suit is one of three filed in U.S. District Court in Erie since January 2019 over the death of an Erie County Prison inmate. One of those cases also ended with a confidential settlement, and the other case is yet to be fully resolved.

The original defendants in the Creaton case were Wexford Health Sources Inc., a Pittsburgh-based health provider contracted to offer medical services at the Erie County Prison, and Medical Associates of Erie, a LECOM Health physician network that offers medical director services through a contract with Wexford, according to the suit.

The other defendants were Millcreek Community Hospital, another LECOM affiliate, where the suit said Creaton was treated before he was sent back to the prison; Stairways Behavioral Health, which the suit said provides mental health services at the prison under contract; a physician, Amy Farris, and two psychiatrists, Justin Aleia and David Snow.

Medical Associates of Erie was dismissed from the case in October 2022 and Farris was dismissed from the case on Sept. 27. All the other defendants reached settlements with Creaton's estate, according to court records.

The records show that the estate "agreed to settlement terms" with Wexford in March, with Stairways and Aleia in May and with Millcreek Community Hospital and Snow in August.

"A key aspect of the settlement terms ... is confidentiality," one of the lawyers for Creaton's estate, John Mizner, said in a series of motions he filed seeking to place the settlement agreements under seal.

Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge Richard A. Lanzillo and U.S. District Judge Susan Paradise Baxter granted the motions. Lanzillo handled much of the case. With all the documents filed under seal, Baxter closed the case on Tuesday, according to court records.

State RTKL does not guarantee access to some settlements

Sealed settlements such as those filed in the Creaton case are generally off limits to the public, according to the Pennsylvania Office of Open Records' interpretation of the Right-to-Know Law.

The law is clear that an "executed settlement agreement" with a public body, such as county government, is subject to disclosure under the Right-to-Know Law. But that holding does not apply to the Creaton case because Erie County was not a defendant.

Government-hired contractors, such as medical providers for prisons, are subject to the Right-to-Know Law, to a degree. The law allows public access to records "of a party with whom the agency has contracted to perform a governmental function on behalf of the agency."

However, the Office of Open Records has determined that settlement agreements involving a contracted medical provider and an inmate or an inmate's family are not subject to disclosure. Those types of settlements "do not directly relate to ... provision of medical care to inmates under the contract with" Erie County, according to an Office of Open Records ruling against the Erie Times-News in 2022 in another case involving the death of an inmate at the Erie County Prison.

Mizner, the lead lawyer for the Creaton estate, represented the estate with another Erie lawyer, Tim George. Mizner could not be reached for comment. George said he could not comment due to a confidentiality agreement.

None of the lawyers for the defendants responded to emails seeking comment.

From 'close watch' to suicide at Erie County Prison

The ordeal that ended with Matthew Creaton's suicide started on Feb. 11, 2020, according to the suit. It says Creaton's other sister found him unresponsive on the floor of his residence in Cranesville, "apparently from an attempted suicide via drug overdose."

The sister revived Creaton and called state police. Creaton was uncooperative with the troopers who arrived. They arrested him and said they were taking him to the Erie County Prison on a civil charge of nonsupport, according to the suit.

One of the troopers, the suit claims, said that, though Creaton had to go to jail now, "he's gotta get help. He's gotta go to rehab or something."

Creaton went to the Erie County Prison, where he was briefly sent to the emergency room at Millcreek Community Hospital, according to the suit. He was examined and returned to the Erie County Prison, also on Feb. 11, 2020. At his initial intake at the prison, according to the suit, Creaton said he was "thinking about suicide."

At the prison, Creaton was placed on "close watch" due to his "possible intentional overdose," on the sedative Xanax, prior to his admission to the prison, according to the suit.

"The prison medical records," according to the suit, "reveal that Matthew was at serious risk of injury or death from suicide, including that Matthew was charged with failure to pay child support, and he was noted to have a history of major depression as diagnosed and treated at Stairways Behavioral Health."

On Feb. 14, 2020, the prison medical staff prescribed Creaton an antipsychotic medication and an antidepressant, and directed a "step down" process from close watch for 48 hours, with the watches then to be discontinued, according to the suit.

On Feb. 16, 2020, Creaton refused to take his antipsychotic medication, according to the suit. That same day, the suit claims, Creaton "was removed from any sort of watch whatsoever," and refused to take his antidepressant the next day, Feb. 17, 2020.

"In other words," according to the suit, "the day after Matthew had all suicide protections removed ... he was refusing to take any of his prescribed mental health medication."

On Feb. 19, 2020, according to the suit, the medical staff conducted a daily assessment on Creaton to gauge opiate withdrawal. The results of the exam showed "a clear sign of medical distress" and showed Creaton "was in the middle of a mental health crisis demanding immediate medical intervention," according to the suit.

Creaton, alone in his cell, hanged himself that day. He was immediately taken to UPMC Hamot, where he died.

Raising a defense ahead of the settlement

Creaton's removal from suicide watch, or close watch, was a key point of contention in the lawsuit. While Creaton's lawyers argued that he should have never been removed from watch, the defense said the removal was proper, according to court records.

One of the psychiatrists who treated Creaton at the prison and helped sign off on his removal from watch was David Snow, one of the defendants, according to court records. He was working for Millcreek Community Hospital at the time.

Lawsuit filed: Suicide of inmate at Erie County Prison spurs federal civil rights lawsuit over medical care

Snow acted properly, his lawyer argued in a court filing on July 17, in which he sought to get part of the case against Snow dismissed.

The decision to remove Creaton from close watch was "based upon Mr. Creaton's willingness to engage and cooperate during his evaluation, his willingness to initiate medication trials and his denial of suicide ideation," according to the filing. "There is simply no evidence of record suggesting Dr. Snow intentionally removed Mr. Creaton from 'close watch' in the reckless and deliberately indifferent manner alleged by Plaintiff."

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A judge never ruled on Snow's dismissal request. On Aug. 8, three weeks after Snow's lawyer filed the request, Creaton's lawyer filed a motion showing that the case against Snow and the other remaining defendants had been settled.

Other inmate death cases

Since January 2019, two other lawsuits have been filed in U.S. District Court in Erie over deaths of Erie County Prison inmates. Unlike the case of the Matthew Creaton, the two other cases do not involve suicides. But the plaintiffs in those cases claimed the prison medical care was deficient and contributed to the deaths of their relatives, who were inmates.

● One of the two cases was filed by the estate of Erie resident April D. Corritore, 33, who died of an infection in Oct. 20, 2018, while at Millcreek Community Hospital, where she had been sent from the prison. The case was settled in February 2022, with the terms filed under seal in federal court.

The estate sued Wexford Health Services and other contracted medical providers in January 2019. Corritore's family claimed that the medical providers at the prison were deliberately indifferent to Corritore’s worsening health before she died. Erie County was not a defendant in the case.

● The third inmate case is still active though partially settled. The plaintiff is the estate of Waterford resident Mathew Orsini, 19, who died of complications from a congenital heart condition on Feb. 25, 2019. He died at UPMC Hamot, where he had been sent from the prison.

The estate sued in August 2020. The suit claims Wexford and other contracted medical providers were deliberately indifferent to Orsini's medical care by failing to provide proper care to address his cardiac problems.

The suit states that Orsini had Marfan syndrome, an inherited connective-tissue disorder that left him with an enlarged aorta. Orsini had received an aortic valve replacement and had been prescribed drugs for his cardiac disorders, according to the suit.

Wexford is denying wrongdoing along with the other defendants, according to court records.

Unlike in the other two inmate-death cases, the Orsini lawsuit named Erie County as a defendant. The county settled with the Orsini estate for $10,000 in December 2022, according to a copy of the settlement agreement that the Erie Times-News obtained from the county under the state's Right-to-Know Law. The county was dismissed from the case in April.

Contact Ed Palattella at epalattella@timesnews.com. Follow him on X @ETNpalattella.

This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Case over suicide at Erie County Prison ends with confidential deals