Family of Amanda Cahill, who died in a Philly jail, is still searching for answers
Philly Voice, 09/20/24: “Family members of Amanda Cahill – the 31-year-old mother of two who died earlier this month in a Philadelphia jail – say their grief is compounded by their inability to get answers about how she died on the city’s watch and by reports that people incarcerated with Cahill were clamoring to get her help.
Cahill was arrested on a drug charge Sept. 4 along with 33 other people during a sweep Philadelphia police conducted in Kensington. At the Philadelphia Industrial Correctional Center, a nurse who performs narcotic withdrawal assessments saw Cahill at 1 a.m. Sept. 7 in her cell. Hours later, at 7:30 a.m., Cahill, 31, was found unresponsive, and when attempts to revive her failed, she was declared dead at 7:45 a.m., the Philadelphia Managing Director’s Office said.
City officials have declined to comment on Cahill’s cause of death because it is under investigation. Cahill’s mother, Gina Clark, said she has hired an attorney.
‘I feel like they think that my daughter was just another unloved junkie, and they were wrong,’ Clark said. ‘I think that they feel like it was going to be swept under the rug, like they weren’t going to get caught in this one. But they were wrong, because I’m not going to stop until something’s done about it.’
On Tuesday night, Cahill’s cousin Kayden Hujack and activists interrupted a panel discussion on mass incarceration, held at the Free Library of Philadelphia’s Parkway Central Branch. Michael R. Resnick, commissioner of the Philadelphia Department of Prisons, was among the guests sitting on the panel.”