https://www.tvanouvelles.ca/2019/03/27/un-caid-de-550-livres-reclame-253-000-a-letat550-pound king claims $ 253,000 to the state
Michael Nguyen | The Journal de Montréal | Published on March 27, 2019 at 04:19 - Update at 04:22
Bed too small, wheelchair too narrow, access to showers almost impossible ... A guy of 550 pounds who says he lived a real hell penitentiary now wants to force the state to pay him $ 253 000 compensation.
"[Corrections] had to take all the necessary measures to ensure that their living environment did not compromise their dignity," reads Rene Raymond's recent civil suit.
Raymond, 58, is a former restaurateur turned drug dealer in Montérégie. The guy, who paid a share of his profits to the Hells Angels, was pinned in 2015, and the following year he was sentenced to eight years incarceration.
The problem, he says in his pursuit, is that Archambault Penitentiary in Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines did not have a cell for its large body size and disability.
"He has both legs amputated, wheelchair and overweight: he weighs about 550 pounds," reads the court document filed at the courthouse in Montreal.
Until his transfer, a year later, Raymond said he was isolated in a cell of the health center, where he was confined 23 hours a day, because his wheelchair, although too small, did not pass the doors of regular cells .
Side lying
"The bed was so tight that Raymond was forced to lie down," he says in the suit, while lamenting that his stature prevented him from having access to trailers where he could have invited a spouse.
Worse still, access to the showers would have been virtually impossible, so he could have taken only two in a year.
"It is not acceptable that a prisoner in the federal prison system is only allowed two showers a year," he complains in the civil suit.
Even access to the toilets would have been difficult, so Raymond was forced to "perform dangerous acrobatic feats to balance himself over his seat," he complains.
Hunger-strike
According to the court document, the correctional services were aware of Raymond's precarious situation, but instead of transferring it, they were keeping him waiting. After several months, disappointed, Raymond then began a hunger strike of several days.
It took the intervention of a lawyer and several other months of waiting for Raymond to finally be transferred to places better suited to his strong stature.
Unless resolved amicably, the civil suit will be presented to a judge shortly. As the case is before the courts, Correctional Services Canada can not comment on the case.
♦ In 2012, the 430-pound detainee Michel "Big Mike" Lapointe earned $ 10,000 in a similar case.
