Print

Email story

Comment

Email editor

Inmate hanged himself in county jail, officials say

The man, who pleaded guilty to battering his wife, was found by a corrections officer and an inmate delivering dinner.

By JONATHAN ABEL
Published November 4, 2005

BROOKSVILLE - Daniel R. Warren, a shrimp boat captain, had been sentenced to three years in state prison for battering his wife. But he never made it there.

In his sixth day awaiting transfer from the Hernando County Jail, he died after apparently hanging himself in his cell.

About 1 p.m. Wednesday, Warren, 39, lost two front teeth in a fight with two or three other inmates at the jail. About 5 p.m., after Warren was transferred to a segregated cell, he was found by a corrections officer and an inmate as they were delivering dinner.

According to a Hernando County sheriff's report, Warren was sitting on the floor, not breathing, a sheet fastened around his neck, and his hands turning blue. Corrections officers tried to hold up the body as they untied the sheet.

He was taken to Brooksville Regional Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.

All preliminary indications point to suicide, said Deputy Donna Black, spokeswoman for the Sheriff's Office, though the official cause of death awaits an autopsy report.

Cathie Sullivan, spokeswoman for the county jail, which is operated by Corrections Corporation of America, said results of an internal investigation would likely be reported to the county today.

The last time someone committed suicide at the Hernando jail was in 2002, when Laren Sims Jordan hanged herself. An internal investigation cleared jail employees in that case.

The events leading up to Warren's incarceration and death began on July 8, when authorities say he attacked his wife at their home on Baltimore Street, north of Weeki Wachee.

Warren pleaded guilty on Oct. 27 to aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and witness tampering in connection with that case.

According to a sheriff's report, Warren and his wife, Angela Warren, were arguing about money problems when Daniel Warren turned violent.

The report says he struck his wife with his fists and feet before getting a wooden stake from another room and attacking her.

"I had a broken arm completely in two, eight broken ribs, cheek was glued and swelled shut," Angela Warren said Thursday from her home in Ohio, where she moved with her kids after the fight.

"I may sound like a coldhearted b----, but I couldn't care two s---- (about Daniel Warren's death). The only thing that gets me is that he doesn't have to serve his prison time," she said. "Let him sit in the prison and stare at those four walls."

But Warren's family and friends complained of neglect on the part of both the jail and the justice system.

Warren was a victim of Hurricane Wilma and the Public Defender's Office, said Warren's best friend, Glen Matthews, who spoke as an intermediary for Warren's mother.

When Wilma caused court to be canceled in Hernando a week ago Monday, Warren's court date was postponed till Tuesday. But no one told him until he called Tuesday afternoon, Matthews said.

When Warren and his attorney went before the judge, the public defender was so unfamiliar with the case that Warren wanted a continuance, Matthews said. But the judge would not grant one because the state had to make special arrangements for Angela Warren to come down from Ohio to testify, Matthews said.

Though Warren pleaded guilty to aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and witness tampering - for smashing the phone as his wife tried to dial 911 - he was forced into the plea by circumstances, Matthews said.

"He took a plea agreement because he could not get adequate representation (from the public defender). He tried and tried and made several attempts to get with his attorney," Matthews said.

A call to the Public Defender's Office by the Times on Thursday was not returned.

Before his arrest, Warren was a captain of the shrimp boat Deandre Lynn, which is based in Hernando Beach. Roger Lee, his partner on the boat, said that when the two of them talked a week ago Wednesday, they were already making plans to resume business when Warren was released.

"I am very angry," Lee said. "I feel that he should have got medical attention from the fight he was in ... and yet they let him sit in the holding cell all of the day and then he dies there."

Warren's sister, Heidi Nazelrod of Spring Hill, also blamed the jail for Warren's death.

"I feel like there was neglect on the jail's part," she said. "Where was the supervision? Someone who hadn't even been in jail a week, they're supposed to be supervised, they're supposed to be handled because it's a transition phase."

"Danny was a good man despite what anybody might say about him," Nazelrod said. "He's been in my life 29 years."

Jonathan Abel can be reached at jabel@sptimes.com or 352 754-6114.

[Last modified November 4, 2005, 01:41:19]