Million Dollar Spork?
By Ben Briscoe
NewsChannel 10
PAMPA, TEXAS - An area jail is being sued by one of its inmates for one million dollars, but the merits of the complaint are raising concerns about wasting the court's time and your taxes.
The suit was filed in federal court against three gray county jail employees including Sheriff Don Copeland. In the complaint inmate Darren Hathcoat writes by hand that the three defendants ordered, "all the jailers and the civilian kitchen workers to feed me off of styrfoam tray with no utinsels. I had to eat with my bair hands for 11 months."
Because they did not let him use a spork like other inmates... Hathcoat writes the court should, "award me one million dollars for the demorilization and metal anguish."
District Judge John Board says the courts are flooded with civil suits from prisoners. There's so many, Texas has two separate statues on the books about these inmate complaints. If a judge thinks the claim from an inmate is frivolous - they can either dismiss it without a hearing or require the person in jail to pay money up front in case it ends up being a waste of time. But board says judges exercise extreme caution.
Not for sure if the quote from the inmate is verbatim with the misspellings or slip-shod editing on the website's part.
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