A criminal investigation in the case of Sandra Bland is moving slowly along, as confirmed to a federal judge in Texas, as well as a wrongful death lawsuit. Officials with Prairie View and Waller County in Texas were supposed to have turned over a bunch of documents and other items to lawyers for Sandra Bland’s family by last Tuesday, November 10. Instead, they asked that the lawsuit be dismissed two days later.
Late yesterday afternoon, a hearing was held in which U.S. District Judge David Hittner questioned attorneys for both Prairie View and Waller County. An officer from Prairie View transported Bland to the Waller County jail after she was arrested by Brian Encinia. Bland was found dead in her Waller County jail cell three days later. Her family states that Bland would not have killed herself. Waller County has argued that Bland committed suicide because she was despondent over being incarcerated and not being bailed out by her family.
Prairie View officials have been hit with a subpoena for information related to their contact with Bland. During yesterday’s hearing the city asked to be protected from the subpoena so as not to impede the larger investigation being conducted by the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS): You are asked to give information in a criminal probe, but you want to be excused from giving the information so as not to hinder the criminal probe. How that works I’m not entirely sure.
At any rate, a grand jury that was put together to look into Bland’s death met for the first last week also. Their job is to see who, if anyone, will face criminal charges in the case. The hearing revealed that a lot of tasks in the case remain undone. For example, the final report of the independent autopsy of Bland, as requested by her family, has not been completed. Also, while officials in Prairie View and Waller County did confirm to the judge that DPS is actively conducting a criminal investigation into Bland’s death, the lawyer’s for Bland’s family says they can’t get any confirmation on that is really happening. Sounds kind of messy to me.
Judge Hittner said he will decide on whether or not to let Prairie View slide out of the request for information in the coming days.