A family is suing Philadelphia over the death of a man in jail custody
Several other families in recent years have sued Philadelphia jails, saying their loved ones did not receive adequate medical care for drug-related issues.
The family of a man who died in a Philadelphia jail last year contends in a lawsuit filed this week that jail staff did not offer him treatment for opioid withdrawal before his death.
Andrew Drury died in an intake cell at the Curran-Fromhold Correctional Facility in Holmesburg on March 9, 2025. The lawsuit says he was in the cell for 36 hours, despite suffering from opioid withdrawal symptoms.
During that time, the suit says, Drury received no medical care, and jail staff did not alert medical personnel that he was going through withdrawal. Drury had a known opioid addiction and had suffered withdrawal symptoms at the jail in the past, according to the lawsuit. His cause of death was listed as “pending,” the lawsuit said.
Prison officials declined to comment Wednesday. A lawyer for Drury’s family did not return a request for comment. The lawsuit seeks general monetary damages from the city, the jail system, and the state attorney.
Several other families in recent years have sued Philadelphia jails, saying their relatives did not receive adequate medical care for drug-related issues.
In 2024, the family of Carmelo Gabriel Ocasio, 22, accused jail staff of ignoring his cellmate’s pleas for help when Ocasio fell unconscious, overdosed, and died after obtaining fentanyl and benzodiazepines at the jail in 2022.
The family settled with the city for $65,000; further details of the settlement were not made public.
In 2025, the family of Amanda Cahill sued the city, saying she overdosed on fentanyl illicitly obtained while in the jail after she was arrested in a Kensington sweep in 2024. The suit said she cried and begged for help, and fellow inmates tried to get the attention of correctional officers before she was found unresponsive in her cell.
A judge dismissed portions of the lawsuit in late December, but attorneys for Cahill’s family later refiled a complaint. Responding to the suit, lawyers for the city acknowledged staffing issues at the jails, but said the city could not have foreseen and did not cause Cahill’s death.
Between 2018 and July 2024, at least 25 people died in Philadelphia jails of accidents related to drug intoxication, a 2024 Inquirer analysis found. The city noted that summer that the overdose death rate in Philadelphia jails was the same as the citywide rate, despite higher rates of addiction among incarcerated people.
Philadelphia’s jail system has been hailed as a national leader in offering medications for opioid addiction and provides buprenorphine, an opioid medication that curbs cravings, to inmates soon after arriving.
But staffing issues created backlogs that kept inmates from receiving longer-term care on time, and advocates said illicit drugs were readily available in the facilities, The Inquirer reported in 2024.
Staff writer Abraham Gutman contributed to this article.