Booked on Misdemeanors, He Was Beaten, Tasered, Pepper-Sprayed Through a Spit Mask and Strapped Into the Restraint Chair Prisoners Called the Torture Chair. He Was Brain Dead in Two Days. The Sergeant Got Life; the County Paid $3.5 Million.
After trial: A settlement approved and funded in July 2007, so the figure is final by construction and no cap applied. The $3,500,000 is Harrison County's share alone: $1,000,000 from its insurer and $2,500,000 raised by county bonds. Health Assurance LLC, the jail's medical contractor, and the City of Gulfport settled separately for undisclosed amounts, so the family's total recovery is larger than the figure shown and not public. The original demand of $150,000,000 was a pleading figure and is not a result. Collectability: the payer is a county that issued bonds to fund the settlement; Prison Legal News reports the funding plan rather than the payment, so the disclosure stays at not public. Attribution: Michael W. Crosby's website carries no biography, so his practice is a record-only entry here with no profile page. Crosby received a public reprimand from the Mississippi Supreme Court in 2018 (Crosby v. Mississippi Bar, No. 2017-BA-00250-SCT) for failing to file a client's criminal appeal brief; under this site's discipline policy a reprimand is recorded and does not disqualify. The lawyer who appeared as co-counsel for the family was later permanently disbarred following federal felony convictions and is not credited here.
Won by Michael W. Crosby, Attorney at Law.
Jessie Lee Williams Jr., 40, a father of seven, was booked into the Harrison County Adult Detention Center in Gulfport on misdemeanor charges on February 4, 2006. In the booking room Sgt. Ryan Teel and other guards punched and kicked him while he was restrained, Tasered him, pepper-sprayed him through a spit mask, wrapped a soaked sheet over his face and beat him in a restraint chair. He was brain dead by February 6. Teel was sentenced to life. Harrison County settled the family's civil rights suit in July 2007 for $3,500,000.
What happened
Jessie Lee Williams Jr. was 40 years old and had seven children. On February 4, 2006 he was arrested on misdemeanor charges, simple assault and disturbing the peace, and taken to the Harrison County Adult Detention Center in Gulfport.
What happened in the booking room was later set out in a federal criminal case against the guards. Sgt. Ryan Michael Teel kicked Williams in the chest. Guards punched and kicked him repeatedly while he was restrained. Teel used a Taser on his back. Pepper spray was applied through a spit mask. He was wrapped in a restraining blanket and then strapped into a restraint chair, which prisoners at the jail called the torture chair, where the beating continued. Witnesses said Teel wrapped a sheet around Williams's head so tightly that his features showed through it, and poured water over it.
Williams arrived at Memorial Hospital at Gulfport in a coma with severe brain trauma. He was declared brain dead on February 6, 2006 and died when life support was withdrawn.
Nine former jailers pleaded guilty in the federal criminal case. On November 1, 2007 Teel was sentenced to two life terms plus 20 years for Williams's death, for conspiring to abuse other inmates and for falsifying reports. Regina Rhodes, Karle Stolze, Daniel Evans, Thomas Preston Wills, Dedri Caldwell, Brodrick Fulton and others received prison terms of their own.
The family's civil suit, Estate of Williams v. Harrison County, S.D. Miss. No. 1:06-cv-196, alleged that the county had a pattern and practice of tolerating violence in the booking room. It sought $150,000,000. In July 2007 the county settled for $3,500,000: $1,000,000 from its insurer and the rest funded by county bonds, a cost the supervisors said would fall on property owners at about three dollars a person a year for fifteen years. The jail's private medical contractor, Health Assurance LLC, and the City of Gulfport settled separately for amounts that were never disclosed, and the American Correctional Association was dismissed.
Michael W. Crosby of Gulfport represented the Williams family. A second lawyer who appeared as co-counsel is not named here; this site does not credit results to lawyers who have been permanently disbarred for conduct in the practice of law.
The $3,500,000 is the county's share and the only figure that is public. The family's total recovery was larger.
Sources
This account is drawn from contemporaneous public reporting and the court record.
- 1.Prison Legal News, 15 September 2008: the February 4, 2006 booking-room beating of Jessie Lee Williams Jr., the Taser, pepper spray, restraint chair and sheet; his brain death on February 6; the guilty pleas and sentences of Ryan Teel and the other jailers; the $3.5 million settlement funded by $1 million in insurance and $2.5 million from the county; the undisclosed settlements with Health Assurance LLC and the City of Gulfport; the case number 1:06-cv-196; and Michael Crosby as the family's attorney
- 2.Insurance Journal, 6 July 2007: the county supervisors' $3.5 million settlement with the Williams family, $1 million covered by insurance and the balance by county bonds; the misdemeanor booking on February 4, 2006 and his death two days later; and the pending federal criminal charges against the jailers
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