The Lincoln Parish Sheriff’s Department announced an inmate housed at the parish detention center has died.
On Sept. 24 at approximately 12 p.m., inmate Demerious Jones was found unresponsive in his cell at the Lincoln Parish Detention Center. Deputies and medical staff began rendering aid until Ruston Ambulance Service arrived. Jones was transported to Northern Louisiana Medical Center. Despite lifesaving measures, Jones passed away.
An autopsy has been ordered to determine cause of death. Per policy, members of the North Louisiana Sheriff’s Investigative Unit responded to the Lincoln Parish Detention Center to investigate.
Earlier this year, the Sheriff’s Department announced it had teamed with sheriff’s offices in six other North Louisiana parishes to form the NLSIU to help conduct investigations involving the use of force that results in death or serious bodily injury, or incident like an inmate death.
In April, LPSO spokesman Matt Henderson told the Lincoln Parish Journal that the unit provided “a chance for these agencies to provide more transparency where you might have as many as six agencies coming in to investigate an incident that occurred at a parish sheriff’s office.”
Henderson said the sheriff’s office in the parish where an incident occurs will not be part of the North Louisiana Sheriff’s Investigative Unit studying that case.
“Whatever agency is involved in the incident would not have a representative investigating the incident, hence allowing that third-party group to come in and put their eyes on the particular case,” Henderson said.
The Lincoln Parish Sheriff’s Department operates the detention center.
The parishes included in the North Louisiana Sheriff’s Investigative Unit are Caldwell, Franklin, Lincoln, Morehouse, Ouachita, Richland and Union.
NLSIU will release more information when further details become available.
