Tarrant sheriff asks for patience during death investigation of man pepper-sprayed at jail

Tarrant County Sheriff Bill Waybourn is asking the community to be “patient” during the criminal and administrative investigations surrounding an inmate who was pronounced dead at a hospital after being pepper-sprayed at the county jail.

At a Thursday news conference, at which he did not take questions, Waybourn said there are a lot of questions regarding the death of Tarrant County Jail inmate Anthony Johnson Jr., 31, that cannot be immediately answered, but he has been in contact with Johnson’s family.

“They’re very distraught, grieving and they had lots of questions and a lot of them we can’t answer yet,” Waybourn said.

Waybourn added that the sheriff’s office learned “as some of the things have unfolded” that Johnson had a “long history of mental health” issues. Johnson was diagnosed with schizophrenia after serving in the Marines, his sister Janell Johnson told the Star-Telegram.

Waybourn said an alleged altercation that occurred between Johnson and detention officers, who were reportedly conducting contraband checks, was part of “a perfect storm.”

“A perfect storm where once again, that mental health has a significant role,” Waybourn said.

For years, sheriff’s offices and police departments have called for action when it comes to mental health, according to Waybourn.

“There are people that are doing good things, but we’re not where we need to be in regards to mental health,” the sheriff said.

Johnson asked his mother to take him to Millwood Hospital Behavioral Health Center on Friday — where he had been treated before — after noticing symptoms of a schizophrenic episode, according to his family. Hospital staff said he could not stay because he was not displaying signs of violence toward himself or others at the time and he was taken home, according to Janell Johnson.

The hospital has not responded to the Star-Telegram’s request for comment.

Anthony Johnson was arrested that same day by Saginaw police on charges of possession of a controlled substance in penalty group 1, tampering with/fabricating physical evidence with intent to impair, and evading arrest or detention and was taken to the Tarrant County Jail on Saturday, according to a sheriff’s office news release.

The sheriff’s office said Anthony Johnson was arrested after police responded to a call about a man standing in an intersection wielding a knife at a driver. When officers arrived, the sheriff’s office said, he tried to flee on foot.

“You never know what would’ve changed,” had the hospital taken Anthony Johnson in, Waybourn said.

Johnson died Sunday morning when jailers were conducting routine contraband checks in cells, the sheriff’s office said. He refused to exit his cell so it could be searched, according to the release. He began fighting with detention officers and they used the pepper spray “to assist in bringing the inmate under control,” the sheriff’s office said.

After he was pepper-sprayed, Anthony Johnson was examined by John Peter Smith Hospital medical staff working at the jail and was not responsive, the release said.

Medical staff performed CPR and Anthony Johnson was taken to JPS, where he died.

A detention officer was also injured during the incident at the jail and was taken to the hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, the sheriff’s office said.

At the conference, Waybourn mentioned that he also spoke to Anthony Johnson’s family regarding the status of in-custody death investigations.

Just days before Anthony Johnson’s death, another Tarrant County Jail inmate was found unresponsive in his cell on the morning of April 18 after he hadn’t shown up for breakfast. The inmate, identified by the Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s Office as 42-year-old Roderick Johnson of Fort Worth, had been in custody since Dec. 4.

There are “many” investigations that are conducted simultaneously when there is an in-custody death, according to Waybourn. The Texas Rangers are conducting the criminal investigation, while the Texas Commission on Jail Standards and the Office of the Attorney General also review the in-custody death, and the sheriff’s office conducts an adminsitative investigation to determine if there were any policy violations.

Waybourn asks the community to be patient so that the sheriff’s office can provide facts.

“We want to make sure that people know that we’re protecting the investigation and the integrity of the investigation as it unfolds to make sure that we get to the truth and that things happen the way they need to,” Waybourn said.

If criminal wrongdoing by any detention officers is found, Waybourn says they will be held criminally responsible.

“If they have violated our procedures in our expectations, they’ll be held accountable in this agency to the full extreme. But also, I would add that our own officers that are involved in that are also hurting and the peer support team is helping them as we speak and they’re going through their own grieving process as this has been a horrific incident involving many people,” Waybourn said.

According to data provided by the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office, there have been 58 in-custody deaths at the Tarrant County Jail from 2017 to 2023, since Waybourn took office. There have been five deaths in 2024.

Thirty-two of those inmates died due to natural or medical reasons, according to the data. Eleven of them died due to COVID diagnoses, six died by suicide, and one by homicide, the sheriff’s office reported.

Three of the 58 deaths were accidental, three others died due to fentanyl poisoning, and one died form injuries after a shootout with U.S. Marshals. The causes of six of the deaths are pending investigation, according to the data.

In a statement Monday night, Tarrant County Commissioner Alisa Simmons called the rate of deaths at the jail unacceptable.

“I will be asking the United States Department of Justice to investigate the continual problem of people dying in Tarrant County jail facilities,” Simmons said. “Hopefully, my colleagues on commissioners’ court are as interested as I to mitigate these occurrences and will be amenable to seeking a Justice Department review.”

Regarding Anthony Johnson’s death, “there are more questions than answers therefore I am unable to provide details because there has not been an investigation,” Simmons wrote. “I want accountability, I expect transparency and I want a full investigation into everything that occurred, before, during and after the altercation and the subsequent death of Mr. Johnson in our jail, including video footage.”

In 2019, another man incarcerated at the jail, 38-year-old Robert Miller died after he was pepper-sprayed three times at close range during his intake and did not receive medical attention when he told a nurse he could not breathe, a Star-Telegram investigation reported.

A county pathologist ruled in 2020 that Miller’s death was “natural” as a result of a sickle cell crisis.

An amended autopsy report last year reclassified Miller’s manner of death from “natural” to “undetermined.” But the cause was still listed as sickle cell crisis, which remains in contradiction to what outside experts have told the Star-Telegram.

At a public forum in January, Waybourn defended the conditions at the county jail.

“They’re having heart attacks because they use drugs, they use opioids that cause cardiac arrest. We brought people into the jail, and this happens all the time,” Waybourn said.