Metro Philadelphia: “A civil trial began Tuesday in federal court to determine whether the city should be held liable for the death of a man held inside a Philadelphia jail more than two years ago.

Louis Jung Jr., a 50-year-old inmate at Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility, died Nov. 6, 2023, of complications from diabetes.

Attorneys representing the family told jurors that, on the day before his death, Jung was found lying in the doorway of his cell, crying out for medical attention. Instead of providing him access to health care, correctional staff ordered two other incarcerated men to drag him back in and closed the door, they added.

‘If you keep someone in your custody, you have to care for them,’ Nia Holston, a lawyer with the Abolitionist Law Center, said in her opening statement. ‘Louis Jung’s death was not inevitable.’

Holston argued that Jung’s death could have been prevented if correctional officers had not failed in following the Philadelphia Department of Prisons’ policies and ignored his clear signs of diabetic ketoacidosis. Instead, he suffered amid a ‘culture of indifference’ within the jail system, she said.”

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