Otero County jail left a suicidal man alone with a phone cord; county paid $1.05 million
Jacob Gutierrez, 27, was booked into the Otero County Detention Center in Alamogordo in June 2023 and made several suicide attempts in his first days there, including swallowing fentanyl pills and cutting himself, according to a federal wrongful-death suit his mother filed in 2024. The suit alleged that after a mental-health evaluation found him at imminent risk, staff did not keep up suicide-watch checks and placed him alone in a cell with a phone cord, which he used to hang himself. In January 2026 the case was dismissed after a $2,010,000 settlement: Otero County paid $1,050,000 and jail medical contractor VitalCore Health Strategies paid $960,000. The settlement resolved claims against named jailers including the detention center director. No discipline has been reported. The county and VitalCore did not respond to the Santa Fe New Mexican.
Every jail in the United States knows it has a constitutional obligation to protect their detainees from hurting themselves.
Yet still no suicide watch checks were conducted.
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No outcome recorded yet.