Albany

A state prison inmate who claimed his lower right leg was amputated after it was injured during a violent arrest last year has filed a federal lawsuit against several law enforcement agencies and the medical services company that treats inmates at Albany County jail.

The lawsuit filed over the weekend by Kevin T. Kavanaugh, who is serving a five-year prison sentence for a drug conviction, claims that a state trooper and two officers from the Green Island Police Department pummeled him as he was arrested following a car chase that ended in Albany. The civil rights claim also targets Correctional Medical Care, a controversial Pennsylvania-based health care contractor that provides medical services at jails across upstate New York.

State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman recently announced his office had reached a settlement with CMC, which was accused of providing substandard care to inmates. It will require the for-profit company to have an independent monitor oversee its work for three years. The civil settlement calls for CMC to pay more than $540,000 in restitution and penalties, including restitution to Monroe and Tioga counties and a $100,000 civil penalty to the state of New York.

Kavanaugh claims that during his arrest on July 21, 2013, police officers struck him with an unidentified blunt object, stood on and stomped on the back of his legs, and that a trooper kicked him repeatedly in the head while his face was pressed to the ground at the intersection of Clinton Avenue and Henry Johnson Boulevard. After he was handcuffed, Kavanaugh claims police officers from Green Island or Watervliet, who had taken part in the chase, "grabbed his foot and violently ripped his shoe off by repeatedly rolling and twisting Mr. Kavanaugh's foot and ankle," according to the lawsuit.

The claim states that several Albany police officers, who had set up a roadblock to head off the pursuit, stood by and did nothing to stop the other officers "from causing harm and injury to Mr. Kavanaugh."

Kavanaugh was taken to Samaritan Hospital in Troy after he was booked at the Green Island Police Department. In 2012, Kavanaugh had undergone surgery on his right foot following a construction accident, including having 13 screws implanted. The new injuries to the foot during his arrest prompted Samaritan hospital workers to determine that Kavanaugh needed urgent vascular surgery to save the limb, according to his attorney, Lee C. Kindlon of Albany.

Kavanaugh was treated at Albany Med for nine days but did not undergo surgery, according to the lawsuit. Instead, he was taken to the Albany County jail, where he was unable to walk on his discolored and swollen foot. Two days later, after he begged jail officers and medical staff for help, he was taken back to Albany Med and his leg was amputated below the right knee, Kindlon said.

The injuries Kavanaugh allegedly suffered during his arrest "cut off all the circulation to his foot and his foot starting dying from the toes up," Kindlon said. Initially, Kavanaugh was told he would lose his foot, but the delays in his surgery caused the condition to worsen and doctors needed to amputate half his leg, Kindlon added.

The lawsuit targets CMC and Albany County because it alleges the jail's medical staff initially ignored Kavanaugh's complaints that he could not walk and needed to go to a hospital.

Earlier this year, CMC was sued by another former Albany County jail inmate who hobbled through the facility for more than two months with a ruptured knee tendon.

Shamir Leflore, who is serving 13 years in state prison on a weapons charge, claims that for roughly 10 weeks he begged jail staffers for proper treatment and pain medicine after doctors there improperly diagnosed him with a knee strain, gave him a knee wrap and sent him back to his cell.

Leflore eventually was taken to a hospital, where he underwent emergency surgery to repair a ruptured patellar tendon. Leflore, who was injured playing basketball at the jail, contends the delay meant surgeons were unable to reattach his tendon, which had shrunk, and that he suffered permanent damage after a cadaver tendon was used to repair the injury.

CMC has more than $32 million in contracts with jails in 13 upstate counties, including Albany, Rensselaer and Schenectady counties, according to Schneiderman's office. The attorney general said their investigation indicated CMC understaffed facilities and shifted hours for physicians and dentists to less qualified and lower-wage staff to keep costs down.

blyons@timesunion.com • 518-454-5547 • @blyonswriter