Jury awards killer $6M
A federal jury in Denver has awarded $6 million to a 36-yearold convicted murderer confined to a wheelchair from a prison beating he suffered at the hands of a guard.
As part of its decision, the U.S. District Court jury said the prison guard, Mitchell Mullen, beat Jayson Oslund “maliciously and sadistically” with the intent of hurting him, even though the inmate at the time was suffering a seizure associated with his epilepsy, according to court records.
Mullen denied the allegations, maintaining that he was trying to help Oslund get medical help. Mullen is no longer a DOC employee.
A spokeswoman for Colorado Attorney General Cynthia Coffman, whose office handled the defense, said the state was “reviewing its options,” including whether to appeal.
After a two-day trial, the jury on Wednesday awarded Oslund – serving a life term at the Sterling Correctional Facility since 2010 for a murder that happened a year earlier — $5 million in compensatory damages and $1 million in punitive damages.
Oslund filed the lawsuit in 2015, two years after the incident occurred and after unsuccessful efforts to remedy his concerns via a complaint process that inmates are supposed to use. During that process, Oslund said he merely wanted “all (corrections) officers to go through and be able to receive extensive sensitivity training and proper medical training, especially with epileptic people,” according to copies of his complaints included in the federal court case.
He asserted, as he did in his lawsuit, that Mullen had slammed Oslund’s already bleeding head into the concrete floor of his prison cell March 7, 2013, during the seizure — the second one Oslund suffered that day. The injuries left Oslund, who suffers from epilepsy, confined to a wheelchair.
During the first seizure that day, Oslund suffered a head gash that required stitches after falling to the floor, records show.
Unlike the federal jury, a grievance officer for the Colorado Department of Corrections in 2013 determined Oslund didn’t have a viable complaint.
“I can find no documentation to support your claim that this specific officer, in any way performed in an unprofessional manner during the seizure you experienced,” Anthony DeCesaro wrote in his opinion in May 2013. “I contacted (Sterling Correctional Facility) and was informed that attempts were made to assist you during a seizure.”
The case came at a time of heightened awareness to allegations of police and jailhouse brutality.
Oslund filed his federal lawsuit, claiming that his Eighth Amendment right to equal protection had been violated, not long after another high-profile federal lawsuit was settled. In that case, homeless street preacher Marvin Booker’s family agreed to a $6 million settlement with the city of Denver in November 2014, ending their excessive-force case against five sheriff’s deputies. Booker died in the Denver Detention Center in 2010.
Also in 2014, Denver settled another case — that one for $3.25 million — to former inmate Jamal Hunter, who said the city failed to protect him when other inmates scalded his genitals, and prison guards then attacked him.
Oslund represented himself in the lawsuit for more than two years until attorney Zach Warren in Denver joined him last July. Warren did not immediately return messages Friday seeking comment.
Oslund is serving a life term for felony murder from a September 2009 in- cident in Pueblo in which Matt Maez, 18, was beaten and later died of his injuries. The two had scuffled after a party. Maez was accused of stealing items from a car.
Oslund, who had a history of run-ins with police, and his brother Kelly were captured in Nebraska a month after Maez’s death and returned to Colorado for trial.
Kelly Oslund, now 35, was sentenced to 28 years in prison for reckless manslaughter and aggravated robbery in connection with the incident, records show. He has since been paroled.