ALT In another, Fred Harris, a 19-year-old, cognitively disabled inmate who weighed only 98 pounds, was placed in a holding tank with a 240-pound detainee who was known to be violent and was required to have an escort when outside his cell, according to a lawsuit filed by Mr. Harris’s family. Mr. Harris was stabbed and beaten to death, and his cellmate has been charged with murder.

ALT Three months later, facing an old criminal charge of driving while intoxicated, he turned himself in to the Harris County Jail one day in March with a supply of the insulin he relied on to stay alive. After two days, he told his family that no one was allowing him access to the insulin: He was trying to manage his illness by discarding the bread from the sandwiches he was served. He was alone, frightened and cold, he said. His mother, frantic, tried repeatedly to phone the jail but could not reach anyone. “We sent money for him to buy socks and Chapstick, and he never bought them,” she said. Three days later, Mr. Shelton, 28, was found dead in his cell, after having slipped into a diabetic coma. He was one of 21 people who have died this year in the jail

ALT Asked if the jail bore any responsibility, Mr. Spencer said, “That’s hard to say. I mean, those kinds of things, you know, sadly, have always happened in jails and prisons.”