A man with a lifelong mental illness sits strapped into a restraint chair in the Cuyahoga County Jail in Cleveland, Ohio. His arms are bound. A mask covers his face. He cannot run, cannot block, cannot do anything at all. A corporal reaches up, switches off the body camera on his own chest, and punches him in the face six times.
That is not a rumor or a hunch. Two guards pleaded guilty to it. And when the bill came due, the system that hired them did what it always does for its own: it found them the softest landing it could.
The chair
On March 22, 2019, Corrections Corporal Nicholas Evans and Officer Timothy Dugan secured 47-year-old Terrance Debose, a mentally ill detainee, in a restraint chair. According to Prison Legal News, Evans then turned off his body camera. What he forgot was the jail’s own surveillance system, which kept recording as the guards dragged the chair into a cell. Evans punched Debose six times in the face; Dugan struck him twice. They left him there, concussed and bleeding, restrained and alone, for about two hours.
Local outlets including Cleveland 19 aired the footage. Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost put it plainly, as quoted by Prison Legal News: “These two men abused their authority to pound a prisoner strapped to a chair.”
The deal
Here’s what “abused their authority to pound a prisoner strapped to a chair” was worth in court.
On October 15, 2019, Evans pleaded guilty to attempted felonious assault and to tampering with evidence. That second charge is the body camera. He didn’t just beat a restrained man; he tried to make sure there would be no proof. Dugan pleaded guilty to attempted abduction and misdemeanor assault. Both were allowed to resign instead of being fired.
On February 26, 2020, according to the Ohio Attorney General’s office, Evans got nine months. Dugan got ten days, and the AG’s release notes where he served them: the Geauga County Jail, a different county’s lockup, not the Cuyahoga County Jail where he’d worked and where the men he guarded were still sitting.
Nine months and ten days, for a beating on camera that left a restrained man with a concussion. Debose’s verdict on that, reported by Cleveland 19 and others: “That isn’t justice.” He’s right.
It wasn’t one bad night
The Debose beating didn’t happen in a vacuum. It happened inside one of the worst-run jails in the country, during a stretch when, by multiple accounts, the people in charge were busy protecting themselves.
- Eight people died in the overcrowded jail in 2018, according to Prison Legal News. A 2018 U.S. Marshals Service review found inhumane conditions and a pattern of abusive guard behavior, including withholding food as punishment and excessive force.
- The warden told a guard to kill his camera. After detainee Joseph Arquillo died of an overdose in August 2018, Warden Eric Ivey ordered a guard to turn off his body camera during the investigation. Ivey pleaded guilty to filing a false report in October 2019. His sentence: a $2,000 fine and probation, in exchange for cooperating.
- The restraint chair, again. In July 2018, Officer Robert Marsh was caught on video punching Chantelle Glass while she was strapped into a restraint chair. Officer Idris-Farid Clark pepper-sprayed her at close range for six seconds. Marsh got 30 days. Clark, who was also charged with evidence tampering and extortion, got 18 months.
- Guards running drugs. Officers Stephen Thomas and Marvella Sullivan were indicted in September 2019 with a prisoner for allegedly smuggling cellphones, vape pens, heroin, fentanyl and marijuana into the jail for cash, an investigation that began after an inmate’s overdose.
- The man at the top. Former jail director Ken Mills was indicted for lying to county council about blocking the hiring of nurses before the run of deaths, and for dereliction of duty. A jury convicted him on four misdemeanor counts in 2021 and he served nine months, but News 5 Cleveland reports an appeals court later reversed those convictions and ordered a new trial.
Count the body cameras in that list. A corporal switches his off before a beating. A warden orders one off during a death investigation. That isn’t a coincidence. It’s a culture that knew exactly what the cameras were for, and made sure they weren’t on when it mattered.
How long they actually did
| Who | What | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Nicholas Evans, corporal | Turned off his body camera, punched restrained Terrance Debose six times; pleaded to attempted felonious assault and tampering with evidence | 9 months in prison |
| Timothy Dugan, officer | Two more punches; pleaded to attempted abduction and assault | 10 days, in the Geauga County Jail |
| Robert Marsh, officer | Punched Chantelle Glass while she was strapped into a restraint chair | 30 days |
| Idris-Farid Clark, officer | Pepper-sprayed Glass at close range; also charged with evidence tampering and extortion | 18 months |
| Eric Ivey, warden | Ordered a guard’s body camera off during a death investigation; pleaded to filing a false report | No jail: $2,000 fine and probation |
| Ken Mills, jail director | Convicted of falsification and dereliction of duty | Served 9 months; convictions later reversed on appeal |
Sources: Ohio Attorney General; Prison Legal News; News 5 Cleveland (linked below).
Watch the footage
The jail’s own surveillance video of the Debose beating was released in June 2019. Warning: it is graphic.
- Cleveland 19: inmate beating video released involving indicted Cuyahoga County Jail officers (graphic)
- NBC News: video released of Ohio corrections officer who turned off body camera beating mentally ill inmate
- WKYC exclusive: officers appear to punch restrained inmate
- Cleveland 19: officers plead guilty (with video)
The courtroom breakdown that sent me down this road:
The protection racket
Every one of these men knew the rules better than any prisoner in that building. They enforced them every day. And when they broke them, the system bent over backwards: reduced charges, “attempted” assault for six completed punches, resignations instead of firings, jail time served in another county, a fine and probation for the warden who killed a camera at a death scene.
That’s what protection looks like in America when you wear the uniform. Not a cell with your name on it. A plea deal, a short stay somewhere quieter, and a lawyer telling the judge how dangerous it would be for you to serve time like everybody else.
I say no. A guard convicted of beating a man in restraints should do his time the same way the man he beat would: general population, no badge discount, no special wing, no transfer to a friendlier county, and his record in plain words where everybody can read it. He spent his career counting on the dark. The least the rest of us can do is turn the lights on.
Sources
- Ohio Attorney General, “Cuyahoga County Corrections Officers Sentenced”, Feb. 26, 2020
- Prison Legal News, “Multiple Indictments, Prison Sentences, for Guards and Officials at Violence-Plagued Cleveland Jail”, May 1, 2020
- Cleveland 19, “2 Cuyahoga County Corrections officers going to jail for attack on restrained inmate”, Feb. 26, 2020
- Cleveland 19, “Video shows Cuyahoga County jail officers pummeling inmate”, June 7, 2019
- News 5 Cleveland, “2 Cuyahoga County jailers who were caught on camera beating restrained inmate plead guilty”
- News 5 Cleveland, “Former Cuyahoga County Jail Director Ken Mills to get new trial”
- WKYC, “Former Cuyahoga County Jail guards get time behind bars for inmate assault”
- Video that prompted this post: “Jail Guard Punches a STRAPPED-DOWN Man 6 Times”, Judge Harlan Courtroom (YouTube commentary channel; facts above are from the news and official sources, not the video)
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