*I counted them all. Just short of a dozen SLO workers, at one time of another, all from different departments, were standing there in their gloves, Armour masks or plain clothes, watching, on January 22, 2017, as a naked man writhing in obvious distress, lay on a cold, cement floor until he was motionless.
Andrew Holland, 36, was a medically diagnosed schizophrenic man, incarcerated for god only knows what. As the graphic videos will show, he had been in solitary confinement for most of his 16 months at San Luis Obispo County Jail and for the last 48 hours of his life, he was fully restrained in a chair, wearing one of those headpieces best described as similar to the one worn by Anthony Hopkins in the 1991 film, ‘The Silence of the Lambs.’
Why it would take a half dozen men dressed in tactical gear to contain one man is beyond comprehension. And even people just standing around watching were wearing gloves.
A real time example of how our tax dollars are being used. But that’s a story for another day.
But I will say this right now: These people, every single one of them, led by and under the watch of SLO County Sheriff Parkinson are an absolute embarrassment to humanity.
Recently released video shows Holland, an Atascadero resident, who was pronounced dead on the floor of his holding cell at 5:36 p.m. on Jan. 22, 2017, an hour following his release from the restraint chair he had been in for the past 46 hours. They took him from that room solely for the purpose of cleaning up the urine and feces he had emptied his body of.
He had been given little to no food and water during that time.
The Tribune?s review of more than 100 hours of jail surveillance footage contradicts county officials? version of events leading to Holland’s death.
…and at some points even show deputies laughing as the helpless man lies dying on the floor.
Contrary to the county’s account of the incident, the video shows that Holland wasn?t ?found unconscious and unresponsive? and was not ?under the continual care of a physician? at the time.
In an email Thursday, County Administrative Officer Wade Horton called the video “extremely painful to watch.”
“What happened to Andrew Holland was a tragedy that impacts our entire community,” Horton wrote. “Although we can’t bring Andrew back, our county has made and continues to make changes in response to this terrible event.”
CAUTION: GRAPHIC VIDEOS
New Times reports…
Sharon Holland spoke quietly into a nest of microphones in the hope that her son might be remembered for more than the way he died.
“Andrew was more than an inmate. He was more than a man that had a brain disease. He was bright and funny. He was a loving son,” she said. “He would give the shirt off his back to anyone, and he often did.”
See Mr. Holland’s family speak about their son, his hopes and how he ultimately died, in the video directly below.
