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‘Not knowing where to go’: Montana’s sparse landscape for alcohol detox

December 20, 2024
An emergency department sign in Missoula, Montana on Thursday, December 12, 2024. With very few treatment options available in Montana, hospital emergency departments are often the only place people can go when they are experiencing alcohol withdrawal. However, patients often end up leaving without the medication they need to manage withdrawal symptoms and they typically aren’t referred to inpatient or outpatient treatment programs. Credit: John Stember

Gaps in mental health training, rural access to care compound Arizona’s maternal mortality crisis

December 20, 2024
Araceli Aquino-Valdez, shown at her Yuma home on Dec. 17, 2024, struggled to find mental health care after experiencing postpartum depression following the birth of her first child. Photo by Izabella Mullady | AZCIR

Black farmers face specific, outsized challenges in rural mental health crisis

October 1, 2024
Two road signs in Tatums, Oklahoma. One reads "TATUMS: The friendly people make the difference," and the other "Tatums, Okla: Home of T-Okie."

Cover-up Alleged in Pottawatomie County Jail Deaths

Shelly Cailler says goodbye to her wife, Kellie Wright, after Wright was detained at the Pottawatomie County jail. ©Todd Pendleton/The Oklahoman
Shelly Cailler says goodbye to her wife, Kellie Wright, after Wright was detained at the Pottawatomie County jail. ©Todd Pendleton/The Oklahoman

Oklahoma Watch, by Whitney Bryen, September 6, 2023: Pottawatomie County jail officials apparently defied state laws and a judge’s order when they concealed information on the unexplained deaths of seven vulnerable detainees.

All seven people arrived at the jail with medical and mental health or substance use complications that required care. None of them made it home alive. Most of their families still don’t know why.

An Oklahoma Watch investigation found that the Pottawatomie County Public Safety Center withheld public records and defied court orders to produce them. It ignored families’ requests for medical records. And it reported only two of the deaths to state regulators — all under the charge of jail director Breonna Thompson, better known by her middle name, Rochelle.

“When you take the least of us and you treat them with this kind of disrespect to the point that it leads to their demise, that’s just inhumane,” said attorney Ronald “Skip” Kelly, who is suing the jail on behalf of one of the families. “I have never experienced the kind of ruthless disrespect to families that I’ve seen from this jail, refusing to give them any information. If there was ever a jail that needs to be under investigation by the U.S. justice department, it’s that one.”

Read more from Oklahoma Watch here.