(Patriot.Buzz) – The mother of Christian Walker, a 44-year-old inmate who died in prison, has filed a lawsuit asserting that her son was fatally beaten by officers who left him lying in a pool of his own blood.
Filed in a state court, her legal move seeks to challenge the narrative around Walker’s death, which occurred last year in High Desert State Prison.
Annette Walker shared with KLAS that her quest is for truth rather than revenge in her pursuit for clarity and accountability.
“I’m going to be living with this the rest of my life. Crying every day and songs that I hear, pictures that I see. It’s just never going to end for the rest of my life,” Annette expressed outside the Regional Justice Center. “It’s all in God’s hands, is all I can say.”
Christian’s prison history goes back to 1999 when he started serving a sentence for second-degree murder, among other charges.
Although the Nevada Attorney General’s Office cited a lack of evidence for prosecution, the lawsuit points to new evidence including witness accounts, photographs and an expert opinion contradicting the coroner’s findings.
Graphic images, part of the lawsuit documents, showed Walker with extreme bruising, challenging the Clark County Coroner’s determination that hypertensive cardiovascular disease caused a natural death.
Notably, the coroner’s report recognized blunt force trauma but deemed it not fatal.
Contrarily, forensic pathologist Dr. Larry Sims said the official cause of death could be brain swelling from blunt head trauma, which suggests an assault and calls for a thorough autopsy reevaluation.
The legal complaint levels accusations against Nevada Department of Corrections (NDOC) leaders and Clark County coroners for allegedly conspiring to conceal the truth behind Walker’s death.
It lists various defendants, including NDOC Director James Dzurenda, and highlights systemic issues within NDOC based on legislative audits and reports on the department’s use of force protocols.
Further, the lawsuit cites failures to report use of force incidents, including Walker’s case, as mandated by Nevada law, which reveals a pattern of unaccountability within NDOC.
Supporting the complaint, an anonymous letter from DOC employees alleges widespread excessive force and cover-ups, while another inmate’s letter suggests a feared culture of violence.
When questioned about a potential cover-up, NDOC Director Dzurenda contested such claims and claimed he would rely on external investigations’ conclusions.
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