A Pulaski County jail inmate suffered a fatal asthma attack in December after deputies confiscated her inhaler, a death that has since led the sheriff's office to change its policy on the device.

Jail records released last week under the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act list an inhaler among the items that jailers took from Sharon Lavette Alexander when she was booked in the jail the night of Dec. 13 on a robbery charge.

Jailers found Alexander, 41, of Little Rock, unconscious in her cell the next night. She was taken to UAMS Medical Center and pronounced dead.

A state Crime Laboratory report says she died of natural causes from acute asthma exacerbation.

Sheriff's office spokesman Lt. Cody Burk said an investigation found no criminal wrongdoing in Alexander's death. He said a separate administrative investigation is ongoing.

Alexander's death occurred two weeks after the Pulaski County jail had turned over its medical operations to Turn Key Health Clinics, a private corporation based in Oklahoma City.

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The county, in a cost-cutting move, signed a $3.7 million annual contract with the company effective Dec. 1.

Turn Key Health Clinics declined to comment on Alexander's death.

Pulaski County Sheriff Doc Holladay said the jail changed its policy on inmate property, specifically asthma inhalers, after the fatal asthma attack.

Holladay said the old policy instructed deputies to take an inmate's inhaler and examine the device for drugs and other contraband within 24 hours. Even if no contraband was found, inhalers were not returned to inmates until a prescription for asthma medication could be verified.

The policy continued under Turn Key Health Clinics, according to the sheriff's office.

Holladay said the new policy instructs deputies to immediately inspect an inmate's inhaler and return the device if no contraband is found. The policy allows a prescription to be verified later.

Holladay said the jail confiscates any drug an inmate is carrying to verify it has been prescribed. He also said that any object, no matter how innocuous, has to be examined for contraband when an inmate is booked in the jail.

"Inmates receive mail that has drugs under a stamp on an envelope," he said. "We find that frequently. So it doesn't take much space to hide drugs depending on what kind of drug it may be. We have to balance how we try to protect the security of the facility and ensure that the inmates are provide adequate medical care."

Police and jail records released to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette provide a picture of the final 24 hours of Alexander's life.

North Little Rock police arrested Alexander shortly before 7:30 p.m. on Dec. 13 on accusations that she'd tried to steal clothing from a Target store. A confrontation between her and security guards turned physical, which led police to arrest her on a felony robbery charge instead of misdemeanor shoplifting, according to an arrest report.

A jail checklist shows that Alexander completed a health questionnaire and medical screening about 8:25 p.m. An inmate property receipt shows that jailers conducted a pat-down search and took her inhaler about the same time.

The jail checklist also shows that Alexander, who was initially held in lieu of $15,000 bond, was given access to a phone. Her husband, Glenroy Charles, later told investigators that she'd called him and complained that the jail "would not provide her with her medication," according to a sheriff's office report.

Records show that another inmate, identified as Mya Hamilton, was assigned to Alexander's cell the next day. Hamilton told investigators that Alexander said she had asthma and sickle cell disease and that she needed an inhaler, a sheriff's office report states.

Hamilton reportedly told investigators that Alexander went to sleep after their conversation and began "gasping for air" shortly before 8 p.m. Jail deputy Jaketha Lattimore, who was conducting a security check at the time, responded to Hamilton's cries for help after "several minutes," a report states. Hamilton then told Lattimore that it looked like Alexander was having an asthma attack.

Alexander stopped breathing soon afterward, according to the sheriff's office.

She was pronounced dead later that night.

Holladay said he couldn't recall another instance of a Pulaski County jail inmate dying from an asthma attack. He said the jail's policy of confiscating asthma inhalers had been in place since at least 1994.

"It's one of those things where you hope that the policy is effective and it has been effective for years," Holladay said. "But when something happens, you try to find a way to ensure it doesn't happen again."

Jails and prisons across the country restrict access to medicine and medical devices, including inhalers, over concerns that inmates will misuse them.

In January, the Cook County, Ill., jail in Chicago reported that five inmates had been injured in a brawl that involved two weapons made from asthma inhaler parts. It wasn't the first time an inhaler had been turned into a weapon at the jail. The jail reported in 2014 that an inmate had made a stabbing weapon from a thin strip of metal inside an inhaler.

But limiting access to inhalers has been deadly for asthmatic inmates in some cases, according to reports.

The family of Curtis Garland sued the Texas Department of Criminal Justice last year after Garland, 37, died from an asthma attack in prison. The suit states that Garland repeatedly asked prison guards for an inhaler before he died.

Ashley Gill, 25, died from an asthma attack five days before he was scheduled to be released from prison in Liverpool, England, in 2015. Before his death, Gill filed a formal complaint that jailers had taken away his inhaler.

In 2006, California found that asthma was the leading cause of preventable death in its prison system, killing more inmates than sudden cardiac arrest and congestive heart failure, two conditions that, typically, are far more deadly.

Asthma is a long-term lung disease that inflames and constricts a person's airways. About 24 million Americans have asthma, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Roughly half of those with the disease suffer an asthma attack each year.

Asthma attacks are easily treated, most commonly through inhaled anti-inflammatory medication. Deaths are rare. About one in 100,000 people die from asthma each year, according to the CDC.

Pulaski County jail reports state that Alexander's family members were "understandably upset" after her death. One of them reportedly said that jailers had "allowed her cousin to die."

Alexander's husband and daughter, Porche Alexander, declined multiple requests for comment.

A Section on 04/03/2017