ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, April 26, 1996 TAG: 9604260068
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: RICHMOND
SOURCE: Associated Press
DEPUTIES THOUGHT Thomas E. Wright already had been taken back to jail from court. Instead he had a long, hungry stay in a courthouse holding cell.
The Richmond Sheriff's Office apparently is having a hard time keeping track of inmate Thomas E. Wright.
Wright was left locked in a holding cell at the Richmond Juvenile and Domestic Relations District Court on Friday when deputies apparently thought the prisoner already had been transferred back to the City Jail.
It was not until 7:15 a.m. Monday - 60 hours later - that deputies found Miller in the cell, where he had spent the weekend confined without food.
Officials said they were investigating the situation.
When the Richmond Times-Dispatch asked to speak with Wright on Monday, jail officials said they would make him available. Wright had been sentenced Friday to three months in jail for failing to attend domestic-violence counseling required after he was convicted of assault and battery last June.
But after more than an hour of searching, deputies told a reporter that Wright had been let out the previous day on work release.
Sheriff Michelle B. Mitchell was unavailable for comment Tuesday. She issued a two-paragraph news release saying that the inmate was in good condition and that the matter was under investigation.
The officer in charge of the internal affairs investigation, Lt. A.E. Roehm, said he could not recall a similar situation.
Sheriff's deputies keep inmates in the detention cells while court is in session, then drive all the inmates to the jail at once. Somehow, Wright got left behind.
Capt. LaTanya Jones, director of correctional services, told the newspaper she did not know how many inmates were in the jail.
Last year in Spotsylvania County, an inmate was mistakenly left in an 8-by-12-foot holding cell over the Labor Day weekend.
The inmate, who had been sentenced to two days in jail for driving on a suspended license, was not discovered until his father went to the county courthouse to find out what had happened to his son.
By then, the prisoner had spent five days in the holding cell without food. A deputy was fired over the incident.
LENGTH: Short : 48 linesby CNB