The Texas Department of Criminal Justice reported Wednesday the death of an 84-year-old inmate who was transferred from the Barry Telford Unit with symptoms of COVID-19 to a Tyler hospital last week.
“84-year-old Willie Eanes was taken from the Telford Unit to UT Tyler Medical Center on April 14th suffering from symptoms consistent with COVID-19. Eanes suffered from a number of pre-existing medical conditions and tested positive for COVID-19 on April 15th. Eanes died on April 20th and his family declined to have an autopsy performed, however COVID-19 is believed to have contributed to his death.
There are an additional 6 deaths that are under investigation and pending preliminary autopsy results. 2 other deaths that had been under investigation have been determined to be non-COVID-19 related after the return of preliminary autopsy reports.
In total there are 252 TDCJ employees, staff or contractors who have tested positive for COVID-19 and 594 offenders who have tested positive. There are now 12 employees and 47 offenders who have medically recovered from COVID-19.
16,049 offenders are on medical restriction because they may have had contact with either an employee or offender with a positive or pending COVID-19 test,” according to TDCJ.
TDCJ reported on its website Wednesday the death of 68-year-old James Nealy at the Wynne Unit.
According to TDCJ, there are currently 23 inmates at Telford who have tested positively for COVID-19, 11 inmates with pending tests and 7 inmates have tested negatively. The agency reported that 34 inmates are in medical isolation and 1,015 inmates in medical restriction.
“Medical Isolation is for people who are sick and contagious. Isolation is used to separate ill persons who have a communicable disease from those who are healthy. Isolation restricts the movement of ill persons to help stop the spread of disease,” according to TDCJ. “Medical Restriction is used to separate and restrict the movement of well persons who may have been exposed to a communicable disease to see if they become ill. These people may have been exposed to a disease and do not know it, or they may have the disease but do not show symptoms. Medical restriction can help limit the spread of disease.”
