OSCEOLA COUNTY, Fla. — The Osceola County jail almost has too many problems to count, but Wednesday, one problem has come up again. A woman told WFTV that her mother is behind bars with a fatal illness and she wasn't getting the medication she needed to prolong her life.
Other families of inmates have complained about the same problem and one of the prisoners died.
This current patient's family claims she normally takes about 20 pills a day to treat HIV. When she was first booked into the jail, she wasn't getting them.
Modesta Verdejo is locked up inside the Osceola County jail for a probation violation. She's 54 years old, HIV positive and has diabetes.
"She can become, like, really ill right away if it becomes AIDS," her daughter Nina Glass said.
On the phone from Pennsylvania, her daughter told WFTV Verdejo didn't get all her necessary medications for more than two weeks when she was first booked in. Verdejo told her health care workers checked her blood sugar levels, but she went without the most important medicines for treating HIV.
"A lot can happen in that little bit of time and I was afraid she was going to get worse while she was in there," Glass said.
"It's not true," County Spokesman Larry Krause said.
Krause denies the claims, but this isn't the first time the jail has dealt with the issue. A little over a year ago, WFTV reported on Kenneth Martin. His family said he died after the jail refused his hypertension medication. Days later, Jason Nazarian's family complained the epilepsy patient wasn't getting medication to control seizures.
"This is the third case we're aware of people making similar claims. Do you think there's a problem with this in the jail?" WFTV reporter Jeff Deal asked Krause.
"No, I don't. We have certain protocols we follow and we've been following them," he replied.
But Verdejo's daughter questions that and is just hoping the visit to jail doesn't have a serious impact on her mother's health. Verdejo's daughter said she's supposed to get out of jail Thursday and plans to go the hospital to get checked out.
The jail is not launching any investigation at this point, because it says it followed procedures.