Attorney: Another wheelchair inmate mistreated
TAMPA — A Largo attorney says he represents another inmate who claims that deputies at the Orient Road Jail tipped him out of his wheelchair, leaving him on the jail floor for an hour. That incident, too, was captured on videotape, according to attorney John Trevena.
"The video’s very dramatic," Trevena said. "It’s particularly egregious because after they dump him out, they just let him crawl around on the cell floor." Click here to watch the video.
Benjamin Rayburn, who is serving a 10-year prison sentence, says detention deputies dumped him from his wheelchair and left him helpless on the floor. Trevena says Rayburn is paralyzed from the chest down.
"They casually dump him out of a wheelchair in a cell," Trevena said.
The video of the incident was not immediately available. The Hillsborough Sheriff’s Office did not have an immediate comment.
According to a Hillsborough sheriff’s report provided by Trevena, the incident happened Oct. 3, 2006, at 9:05 p.m.
Rayburn had a glass crack pipe inside the jail, and he swung the pipe at Deputy Brett Strohsack, trying to stab him, according to the incident report. Rayburn then threw the pipe, which shattered, striking Deputy Derek Shaw in the back of the head, the report said.
The incident report says that deputies then "relocated Rayburn from his wheelchair to the holding cell floor."
After the incident, investigators charged Rayburn with aggravated assault, battery on a law enforcement officer and introducing contraband into a county detention center, according to the report.
Rayburn has been arrested 17 times in Florida since 1993, state records show. He was arrested by police in Tampa, Clearwater, Orlando, Winter Park and Temple Terrace, and by sheriff’s deputies in Pinellas, Orange and Seminole counties.
This is the latest in a string of complaints about inmate abuse at the Hillsborough jail that began with an allegation that a deputy dumped a quadriplegic from his wheelchair, leading to criminal charges against the deputy, who resigned.
- Abbie VanSickle, Times Staff Writer