At least seven people have died over the past three years in the Tulsa Municipal Jail, an investigation by The Frontier has revealed. The small lockup beneath downtown Tulsa holds people charged only with low-level misdemeanors. The deaths occurred after repeated warnings from employees about inmate care and supervision.
Here are five takeaways from The Frontier’s reporting:
1. No on-site medical care: The city jail — which Tulsa pays the private security firm Allied Universal to operate — relies only on telehealth providers and emergency responders for medical care. Yet it has routinely accepted people who are dangerously intoxicated or in need of medical attention, in violation of Allied Universal’s contract with the city. One detainee died of a treatable infection after three days in jail while still waiting for a telehealth appointment.
2. The city built the jail to save money: Tulsa once contracted with the county jail, which has medical and mental health staff onsite, to house municipal inmates. But in 2018, after the county sought to nearly double its fee, the city opened its own lockup instead. Then-Mayor G.T. Bynum called it a “business decision,” even though the city ultimately ended up spending more to operate the jail than it had paid the county.
3. Preventable deaths: One man died of a treatable throat infection, another died after being placed in a full-body restraining device, and two young men with mental illness died by suicide. Three others died of methamphetamine overdoses — none of them were found in the jail’s sobering area as required by state law. The death toll is unusually high for a jail of its size: national data suggests a facility like it would be expected to see roughly one death every 10 to 15 years.
4. Prior warnings: Three former employees say they were removed from their positions at the jail after raising concerns about medical care, overcrowding and understaffing before the deaths began in 2023. Another said he was forced to resign and later reached a settlement with the jail’s private operator after filing a federal workplace retaliation complaint.
5. A new inquiry: Mayor Monroe Nichols told The Frontier he was not previously aware of policy or law violations at the jail and said the Tulsa Police Department investigated each death and found no criminal wrongdoing. But after The Frontier presented him with its findings, he directed his public safety commissioner to conduct a review of the jail’s operations.
This article was originally published by The Frontier. You can see the original story here.