Inmate who hanged himself named
Adam Six, 23, was found dead Monday in the Springfield jail, where he was held on a theft charge
SPRINGFIELD — The inmate found dead in the municipal jail on Monday has been identified as 23-year-old Adam Six.
Police said Six apparently hanged himself with a bedsheet just before 4 p.m. in his cell, where he was awaiting trial on a theft charge.
City and state police are investigating.
Six had been in jail since Jan. 15, police said. Shortly before his body was discovered, Six had used the intercom system inside his cell to ask the jail staff about whether his bail had been posted, Detective David Lewis said. He was told his bail had not been posted.
The jail performs hourly checks on its inmates, a requirement by state law, Lewis said. It was on one of those checks that Six’s body was discovered.
It is the second death in the Springfield Municipal Jail since it opened in January 2010.
Kit Milo Brittain, 29, died in March 2011, also having used a bedsheet to hang himself, according to authorities.
“What we do on any significant event that occurs in the jail, we perform a thorough review and we’ve just started it,” Capt. Richard Lewis said of Monday’s death.
“We keep track of any attempted suicides and on how people are trying to do that. … There are varying methods people have tried, and some (inmates) are just trying to get out of jail, but some are legitimate attempts,” he said.
The decision to track such attempts was made after Brittain’s death in 2011, after he, the jail commander and police chief reviewed the jail’s policy on reporting incidents, Richard Lewis said.
Since then, the jail has seen at least 10 other suicide attempts, according to those tracking records. Inmates have tried tearing clothes to make a rope, using a telephone cord, ingesting cleaning fluid or using specially designed jail razor blades that are harder for a person to use to cut or injure themselves, Richard Lewis said.
The jail’s telephone cords have all been shortened to prevent suicide attempts, he said.
Bedsheets are among the more popular items used in suicide attempts. According to the National Study of Jail Suicide, a report distributed by the U.S. Department of Justice, the most common method of suicide in jail is hanging, at more than 90 percent. Bedding is the No. 1 type of material used in hangings, followed by articles of clothing.
In February 2014, one inmate in the Springfield jail unsuccessfully tried to hang himself with bedding but was discovered the by jail staff before executing the attempt. The most recent suicide attempt occurred in October, when an inmate used a pencil to try to cut his arms, Richard Lewis said.
According to a report on jail suicides on the U.S. Marshals Service website, smaller jails tend to have higher suicide rates. Jails with 50 or fewer inmates have rates five times higher than large federal prisons.
The Springfield jail can hold up to 100 inmates.
The municipal jail is designed with a central command post, which is staffed around the clock. The door to every cell is visible from that post, Richard Lewis said.
Additionally, two officers check through the Plexiglas window of each cell every hour to make sure the inmates inside are OK.
When inmates are brought to the jail, they are evaluated to ensure that they are not suicidal, Richard Lewis said. Six showed no signs of suicidal tendencies, and no family members or other inmates reported to the jail staff that he appeared suicidal, Richard Lewis said.
The Springfield jail was built with voter approval in an effort to reduce crime in the city. Previously, Springfield police often arrested suspected criminals, only to have them released within hours from the Lane County Jail because of overcrowding and budget woes.
The municipal jail has been “highly successful” in reducing the Springfield crime rate, Capt. Richard Lewis said.
But suicide deaths are higher in the city facility than in the county jail.
Data from 2009 to 2014 for the Lane County Jail shows no successful attempts in the county’s 326-bed facility. (The county jail can accommodate more than 500 inmates, but only about 326 cells are being used because of budget constraints.)
In 2014, the Lane County Jail made 399 suicide watch placements, meaning inmates deemed suicidal who were checked on more often, and it saw five attempted suicides. In the past five years, the highest number of attempted suicides — 12 — was recorded in both 2010 and 2011.
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