Jail Officials Refused To Give Him His Heart Transplant Medication. Days Later, He Was Dead.

Dexter Barry was arrested last November following a dispute with a neighbor. Five days later, he was dead, after jail officials refused to give him necessary medication for his heart transplant.

According to The Tributary, a news outlet based in Jacksonville, Florida, Barry was arrested on November 18, after a neighbor reported him to the police for allegedly threatening to “beat him up” following an extended dispute over Wi-Fi. While the two never physically fought, Barry was nonetheless arrested on a simple assault charge.

During his time in police custody, Barry—who had received a heart transplant in October 2020—frequently insisted that he needed to take specific daily medications to prevent his body from rejecting his new heart. According to body camera footage of the incident, Barry told one police officer at least seven times that he needed this medication to survive. 

When Barry appeared in court the morning after his arrest, court transcripts show that he once again requested access to his anti-rejection medication.

“I am on medication,” Barry told Judge Gilbert Feltel. “I just had a heart transplant, and I haven’t taken my medicine all day since I have been locked up, and I take rejection medicines for my heart so my heart won’t reject it, and I’m almost two years out…. And the medicine tha