Court worker trapped in cell
Ordeal lasted seven hours in middle of the night
An employee at Broward County’s new court house walked into an inmate holding cell by mistake and wound up trapped for almost seven hours in the middle of the night.
Deborah Johnson, 61, had been conducting an after-hours quarterly inspection of a fifthfloor courtroom around 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Assistant County Adminstrator Alphonso Jefferson said.
She left the courtroom through the wrong door and entered the adjacent inmate holding cell using her security access swipe card, but she didn’t have the additional code she needed to get back out, he said.
Johnson also was without her county-issued two-way radio, whichwould have allowed her to alert others in the building to her situation,
Jefferson said. The reception was too poor for her to get a signal to call out on her cellphone.
It wasn’t until 1:08 a.m. that a text to her daughter finally went through: “Help me. Trapped fifth floor Courtroom 05170. Call 911. I need you.” Johnson’s daughter saw it a while later and called 911at 1:30 a.m.
“She should have been home at 4 o’clock,” her daughter told 911.
Johnson was rescued at 2 a.m., with Broward Sheriff’s deputy Brian Reid describing her as “OK but shaken.”
Officials are investigating why nighttime security in the control room at the courthouse did not spot Johnson while monitoring security cameras that were operational and included coverage of the holding cell.
Johnson, an administrative assistant to the building manager, hasworked for the county for more than 30 years. She told deputies she heard someone in the court room while she was trapped, possibly a member of the cleaning crew. She spoke to the person through the locked door asking for assistance, but help never came, she told Reid.
Johnson could not be reached for comment.
Jefferson said there were no equipment problems and the electronic access card system was functioning as intended. An additional authorization is needed in extra secure areas, he said.
“The courthouse is designed with advanced security features,” Jefferson said. “There are multiple authentications built into the security features in the holding cell areas.”
He said courthouse employees are being reminded to have all of their needed access information and radios with them at all times, Jefferson said.
“We verified and made sure all courthouse employees have multiple authentications. We’re making sure they have their radios on them,” Jefferson said.
There have been complaints about poor cellphone reception in the new 20-story courthouse in downtown Fort Lauderdale, but Jefferson said it was the reinforced concrete in the holding cell that impeded Johnson’s reception. Good reception is not something officials look for in a holding cell, because they don’t want to give inmates any additional opportunities to make contact outside the building, he said.
As for spotty cellphone reception in the rest of the courthouse, Jefferson said it is up to service providers like AT&T, Verizon and Sprint to enhance the signal strength for their customers. The companies have worked on improving service, he said. The courthouse also has public access Wi-Fi that visitors can use to make cellphone calls, Jefferson said.