A federal jury has found Riverside County sheriff’s deputies and jail medical staff were not negligent in the death of a mentally ill inmate who was fatally injured at the Cois M. Byrd Detention Center in French Valley.

Two correctional deputies found Mario Solis unresponsive in his trash-littered cell, flooded with toilet water, at 1 a.m. Sept. 3, 2022. The 31-year-old Riverside man was pronounced dead 39 minutes later after failed attempts by correctional and medical staff to resuscitate him.

Court records indicate Solis died of asphyxia after swallowing a toothbrush, two plastic bags containing bars of soap, a plastic cap and a golf pencil, which punctured a jugular vein. The coroner ruled Solis’ death accidental despite his history of suicide attempts and a prior threat to kill himself with a pencil, according to court records.

Solis’ mother, Sara Solis, sued Sheriff Chad Bianco and his department in May 2023, alleging that jail staff failed to protect her son from harm or provide adequate medical care, and that the department’s policies and practices resulted in her son’s death.

The six-day trial concluded Feb. 3 in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles with a unanimous jury verdict that sheriff’s deputies and jail medical staff did not violate Solis’ 14th Amendment rights through unconstitutional conditions of confinement, inadequate medical care or failure to protect him.

Solis’ death was featured in a recent Southern California News Group series investigating in-custody deaths across four Southern California counties, particularly focusing on how they handle medical treatment and suicide prevention for severely mentally ill detainees.

The family’s attorney, Denisse Gastelum, called Solis’ death one of the worst she has ever seen in the carceral system.

Bianco, who testified at the trial, said in a statement Friday: “We were confident from the beginning that the jury would find in our favor. What is reported in the media and the theatrics by attorneys does not represent fact. I am heartbroken for the families who lose loved ones.”

Bianco, a leading candidate for California governor in early polls, said the Sheriff’s Department “is committed to the safety and security of not only our inmates, but the residents of Riverside County.”

Gastelum said she will appeal the verdict.

Solis had been in custody on a second-degree robbery charge after allegedly attempting to steal a bag of Skittles from a supermarket in April 2022 that resulted in a scuffle with a security guard.

Solis, who had a history of schizoaffective disorder, major depression, anxiety and alcohol abuse, was housed in three jails during his five months in custody. He was “shuttled in and out of safety cells” and twice admitted to Riverside University Health System Medical Center for 72-hour psychiatric holds.

He later was assigned to a special housing unit at Cois Byrd for severely mentally ill inmates considered a danger to themselves or others, court records show.

Solis was one of 19 people to die in Riverside County jails in 2022, the highest death rate there in 15 years.

The deaths fueled a spate of wrongful death lawsuits against the Sheriff’s Department and Bianco in 2022 and 2023 amid ongoing scrutiny over inmate deaths in Riverside County jails. It also prompted an investigation by the state Attorney General’s Office in February 2023 that is still ongoing.

In the dark, early-morning hours outside a McDonald’s in Orange County, a police officer fired a shotgun loaded with so-called less-lethal munitions at a man swinging a belt, cursing at officers and believed to be under the influence of drugs, authorities said.

One, two, three, then four shots of beanbag rounds were fired from a distance of around 30 feet, but the man did not comply with orders to get on the ground, according to a report released Thursday by the Orange County district attorney’s office.

So, the officer fired a fifth shot. It pierced the man’s chest, and he fell to the ground bleeding profusely. Less than an hour later, he was pronounced dead.

Investigators at the district attorney’s office recently determined that Fullerton Police Cpl. Nicholas Jarvis was justified in his use of force that killed Alejandro Campos Rios, 50, on March 6, 2024.

“Corporal Jarvis’ deployment of the less-lethal bean bag shotgun at that distance was in accordance with his training and reasonable under the circumstances,” the report states.

Less-lethal munitions such as beanbag rounds are designed to spread the force of impact over a larger area, without penetrating the skin, offering officers an alternative to bullets when defending against threats. And as police departments’ use of force across the nation has come under greater scrutiny in recent years, the use of less-lethal munitions has grown considerably.

“I can appreciate that there seems to be more less-lethal methods being used as opposed to just straight out shooting people,” said civil rights attorney Kellen Davis, who has prosecuted many use-of-force cases against police departments. “But I think that force, period, should be a last resort. I would appreciate seeing more de-escalation tactics as opposed to use of any sort of force.”

Less-lethal munitions have been attributed to a decrease in fatal officer-involved shootings. However, they remain a controversial tool because of the injuries they can cause — and, in rare cases such as this, death.

The 18-page report released by the district attorney’s office paints a detailed picture of the circumstances leading up to Campos Rios’ death, but it does not provide a clear answer as to how a tool intended to stun and disable became a fatal instrument.

The incident began at 2:55 a.m. on March 6, 2024, when the Fullerton Police Department received a call from a woman who worked at a McDonald’s at 1341 S. Brookhurst Rd., reporting “two homeless men” who appeared to be “actively on drugs” near the entrance of the building. She said she feared for the safety of her co-workers arriving to work.

An officer arrived at 3:06 a.m. and approached Campos Rios, who was singing and yelling and began thrashing his body and a nylon belt with a metal buckle in a “wild manner,” according to the report.

The officer called for backup, and Jarvis soon arrived at the scene, where he also saw Campos Rios acting erratically and assumed he was under the influence of narcotics, according to the report. The officer told Campos Rios to drop the belt and sit on the curb, but he refused.

The officers repeatedly asked Campos Rios to comply with their orders. He ignored them and continued throwing the belt around, cursing at officers, singing, yelling and hitting a pillar with his hands. Aside from the belt, the report does not detail any weapon he possessed.

At 3:13 a.m., Jarvis loaded six 12-gauge drag-stabilized beanbag rounds into a Remington Model 870 Police Magnum shotgun and positioned himself around 30 feet away from Campos Rios, the report states. Officers are trained that the device can be deployed 20 to 100 feet from a target, the report states.

The initial responding officer activated his taser, so that it created a warning noise. Campos Rios then approached him, cursing, and slammed the belt on the ground in his direction. The officer announced that he would fire his taser, and then he fired the taser, which appeared to strike Campos Rios and only agitate him further.

Jarvis then yelled, “Beanbag! Beanbag!” and fired one round at Campos Rios, striking him in the arm. Campos Rios walked away from the first officer and toward the McDonald’s entrance, and Jarvis discharged his weapon four more times, with the final round striking Campos Rios in the chest.

Paramedics began performing lifesaving measures at 3:22 a.m.; Campos Rios was pronounced dead at UC Irvine Medical Center at 3:55 a.m. His cause of death was ruled a penetrating chest injury to the heart and the accumulation of blood between the chest and lungs.

The report states that Jarvis’ use of force was justified because “substantial reliable evidence supports the conclusion that at the time of the shooting, Corporal Jarvis reasonably feared for his life and the lives of others.”

It is rare, but not unheard of, for less-lethal munitions to cause death.

An analysis of nearly 2,000 people wounded by rubber bullets, beanbag rounds and other projectiles used by law enforcement from 1990 to 2017 found that 15% of people were permanently disabled and 3% died. Of the 53 people who died, 26 suffered head and neck trauma, and 15 suffered chest and abdominal trauma.

The study explains that the muzzle velocity of less-lethal munitions is similar to that of lethal ammunition and that severe injuries are typically caused by rounds that strike vital organs from a close range. To prevent severe injury, officers are trained to fire from what have been deemed safe distances.

“Safe shooting distances are not well validated, however, and are highly variable among weapons, countries and manufacturers,” the study states, adding that, in practice, less-lethal munitions may be deployed “from distances much closer than deemed safe.”

In 2021, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill 48 into law, which placed restrictions on the use of less-lethal weapons, including that they cannot be aimed at the head, neck or any other vital organs.

Recent pro-immigration protests in Los Angeles have revived the debate around the use of less-lethal weapons as demonstrators and members of the media have been injured by beanbag rounds and 40-millimeter projectiles, resulting in dozens of lawsuits.

Davis, the civil rights attorney, said that in his experience prosecuting use-of-force cases it is extremely rare for less-lethal munitions to cause death.

“It sounds to me like there was something defective with the weapon,” he said.

When asked about possible defects, a spokesperson for the district attorney’s office said their job was to “determine whether any of the officers violated any criminal laws and did not include a review of any issues of civil liability or whether or not department policy was followed.”

The Fullerton Police Department did not respond to a request for comment Thursday.

It all came flooding back to Jaime Johnson in December 2019, when her brother asked her about the death of her best friend 31 years earlier.

Sara Kay Keesling was 12 years old when she was last seen walking home from a friend’s house near her home in Riverside on Oct. 2, 1988. About two weeks later, a hiker discovered her badly decomposed body behind a hillside water tower, partially buried beneath a pile of trash, north of the 60 Freeway in Rubidoux.

When Daniel Johnson spotted the Atkinson water reservoir during a hike with family members over the Thanksgiving holiday in 2019, he immediately thought about Sara.

“I always remember her when I see the water tower on that hill,” Daniel Johnson said in a Dec. 2, 2019, text to his sister. He subsequently dug up a few old newspaper clippings about Sara’s death on microfiche from the local library, and texted them to his sister.

For Jaime Johnson, 49, it was as if an old scab had been ripped open, triggering a torrent of painful emotions she thought had long abated.

“Her death shattered and forever changed me. I carried the grief and shock for a long time. It has been the most enduring grief of my life,” said Johnson, who now lives in San Diego.

Medical examiners were unable to determine a cause of death because of the condition of Sara’s remains. They concluded she had been dead eight to 10 days by the time her body was found, and her left hand and foot were missing because of animal activity, according to the autopsy and coroner’s investigation report.

Investigators with the Riverside County Regional Cold Case Homicide Team, a multiagency task force, believe Sara was the victim of a homicide. But no arrests have been made in her death, to the chagrin of childhood friends who have been pushing to keep her case alive.

Troubled childhood

By all accounts, Sara Keesling endured a tumultuous family life in a broken home.

Her parents had divorced and were engaged in a custody battle over Sara and her two siblings, Lisa and Jimmy. Family and friends were aware that Sara wanted to avoid visitation with her father, Paul Edward Keesling Jr., who was always referred to as “Ed.”

“She was trying to survive an awful childhood,” Jaime Johnson said. “She had to rely on her wits at way too young an age. She had to grow up way too fast.”