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Michigan City inmate dies while in custody
Michigan City, IN
A homeless man taken into custody in Michigan City for public intoxication has died.

A homeless man taken into custody in Michigan City for public intoxication has died.

Police say they arrested 58-year-old Terry Williams Wednesday morning around 6:30 a.m.

Officers were called to St. Anthony’s Hospital on the report of a drunken man lying down in the parking lot. When they got there, they say Williams smelled strongly of alcohol and urine, and he refused to stand up so they arrested him.

During a cell check at 1 p.m. Wednesday, jail officials say he was breathing heavy and was unresponsive, so they called an ambulance. Williams died in the hospital from an apparent heart attack.

The detective bureau is investigating the incident.

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http://thenewsdispatch.com/main.asp?Sectio...ArticleID=25850

Homeless man who died was well-recognized here

Deborah Sederberg
The News-Dispatch

MICHIGAN CITY - Terry O. Williams liked to have a Bible nearby and he liked his coffee, DeNita Ton, community services director for The Salvation Army, said Thursday.

"With cream," she added. "He liked his coffee with cream."

Williams, 58, didn't stop in for coffee on Wednesday morning.

He died Wednesday at St. Anthony Memorial after he had been arrested early in the morning for public intoxication.

Ton said he was a regular at The Salvation Army in the mornings, looking for just a cup of coffee.

Every once in a while, she said, he stayed at The Salvation Army's shelter for men.

The Army takes turns with other city churches in the Community of Faith Overnight Shelter for Men program from November to April when the shelter moves among various churches. In the warmer months, the Army operates its own shelter.

Michigan City Police Department Chief of Services John Kintzele said Williams was known, at least by sight, by many people in the community.

A tall man at about 6 feet, 2 inches, he had long blond hair and blue eyes and frequently carried a Bible around town.

Ton said The Salvation Army gave him a Bible several times.

Most of the time he was pleasant, she said.

Although he seemed to be homeless some of the time, Ton said, he sometimes shared various apartments with other men.

Wednesday was not the first time police had seen Williams intoxicated.

A police report in fact noted that the information from the report should be sent to Adult Protective Services. The report indicated Williams acknowledged he could use some help.

Williams had been arrested several times throughout the past decade for criminal trespass and public intoxication, among other things, Kintzele said - things common with people who are homeless.

"A lot of times homelessness involves other issues like mental illness or substance abuse, which becomes stressful for their family members and the person," he said. "There's such a big void in society there, I don't think anybody knows what to do."

No one was aware if Williams had family members in the area, although La Porte County Deputy Coroner Dennis Durnell said Williams had a guardian with whom he sometimes lived.

Staff Writer Alicia Ebaugh contributed to this story.

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Hospital taking donations
St. Anthony Memorial is accepting donations of clothing for people who come to the emergency room in need of clean clothing.

Clothing such as jeans and shirts in various sizes would be most appropriate. Belts would be helpful as well. Donations of simple, clean shoes, such as athletic shoes and socks, also would be welcome.

"If we get too much, we'll donate it to The Salvation Army or the Goodwill," said Ellen Sharpe, St. Anthony Memorial physician liaison.
Doctor tells of care before city man died
Terry Williams was offered shower, change of clothes

Deborah Sederberg
The News-Dispatch

MICHIGAN CITY - The physician who examined Terry Williams last week at St. Anthony Memorial has had extensive experience in treating homeless people and street people for a variety of conditions.

Educated at Northwestern University, Johns Hopkins and Duke University, Dr. Casey Jaseon is trained as a pediatrician and an emergency room physician. From 2000 to 2003, he took care of homeless patients at Greater Southeast Hospital, an inner-city facility in Washington, D.C.

Williams died at 1:36 p.m. last Wednesday after he was transported to the hospital from the Michigan City Police Department. He earlier had been arrested on a public-intoxication charge.

He had access to a home and to food, but Williams chose to spend much of his time on the streets. That behavior is not unusual, Jaseon said.

"(Williams) was so much like the people I saw in Washington, D.C.," Jaseon said. "They are people who preferred their independence, and they are very resistant to change."

Williams suffered from trench foot, Jaseon said.

"Soldiers sometimes get it from walking in wet socks and boots," he said.

Although walking likely was painful, Jaseon said, Williams was able to move on his own. Hospital security tapes show him walking.

Police found Williams lying on a lawn with a blanket at about Sixth and Pine streets. He told police he couldn't walk, and police brought him to St. Anthony Memorial's emergency room.

That was at about 1:30 a.m.

Williams was urine-soaked and said he wanted to sleep, Jaseon said.

"I offered him a shower and a fresh change of clothes and dry shoes," the physician said. "I told him a shower would help everything, including his feet, and then he could sleep.

"He kept walking back and fourth to and from the shower."

Williams declined the offer and at some point began to behave belligerently. Jaseon didn't want to go into detail about his behavior, except to describe it as "graphic."

When Williams refused the shower, he went to sit in the emergency room waiting room for a while, and Jaseon went out to see him at some point during the early morning hours.

"I told him, 'The offer's still good'," Jaseon recalled Monday, but Williams continued to decline.

Just a bit after Williams made his appearance in the emergency room, Jaseon said, a homeless man came in to say he had a job interview the next morning, and he worried his odor might lose the job for him.

"He willingly and happily got a shower, he slept overnight and his clothes had a chance to air out."

Hospital security personnel contacted police at about 6:30 a.m. because Williams then was lying in the driveway in front of the hospital, and police took him to the city jail, where he ate breakfast and lunch. When an officer noticed Williams was breathing irregularly, police called Emergency Medical Services to take him to St. Anthony Memorial, where he died.

An autopsy revealed he died of an irregular heart rhythm. Contributing factors were edema, an enlarged heart and coronary artery disease.

"He died from years of alcohol abuse," Jaseon added.