BY ELAINE GOODMAN
Daily Post Correspondent
Family members of a man who killed himself while in custody at a San Mateo County jail have filed revised lawsuits against the county, after a judge dismissed their earlier complaints accusing jail staff of not doing enough to prevent the suicide.
Hunter Bergner, 46, died by suicide at the county’s Maguire Correctional Facility in Redwood City on March 15, 2024, according to the lawsuits. He used a bedsheet to hang himself from a light fixture in his jail cell, one of the lawsuits stated.
Bergner’s wife, Patricia “Carrie” Colet, and his three minor children filed their initial complaint in federal court in November 2024, revising it in February. The complaint names as defendants the county, the sheriff’s office and Sheriff Christina Corpus.
In a separate lawsuit, Bergner’s father, Robert Bergner, sued the county in December 2024 over his son’s death.
The two cases have been deemed “related” and are proceeding in parallel in U.S. District Court. Robert Bergner and Colet are using different attorneys. Colet’s lawsuit said Bergner was in custody for a “minor firearms criminal charge.” Robert Bergner’s lawsuit said Bergner “had just been convicted in a domestic violence matter.”
Inmate safety disregarded, suit claims
Even though Bergner had “expressed his hopelessness and despair” to jail custody and medical staff, “no increased supervision or precautionary measures were taken to mitigate his suicide risk, nor was he placed on suicide watch,” Colet’s lawsuit alleged.
The lawsuit pointed to the county’s “long history of complete disregard to inmate safety and protection,” noting the five in-custody deaths since Corpus took office on Jan. 3, 2023. In 2023, there was a suicide, a drug-involved death, and a death due to natural causes, followed by a death from opioid withdrawal in 2024, according to the lawsuit.
According to Robert Bergner’s lawsuit, Hunter Bergner took prescription drugs for anxiety every day, but jail staff would not give him the medication. Bergner’s anxiety increased, the lawsuit said, and he started thinking about suicide. Jail staff’s “deliberate indifference” led to Bergner’s death, the lawsuit claimed.
County wants suits dismissed
The county filed motions to dismiss both lawsuits, and Corpus, who was named in Colet’s lawsuit, filed a motion to dismiss in that case. In a pair of June 18 decisions, U.S. District Judge Charles Breyer granted the motions to dismiss the cases, but gave the parties 28 days to revise their complaints.
In Robert Bergner’s case, the county argued in part that anxiety wasn’t a “serious medical need” of the sort “that could give rise to a deliberate indifference claim.”
The judge agreed.
“It cannot be that every recently convicted inmate with a history of anxiety and nothing more to indicate suicidal ideations presents a heightened suicide risk,” Breyer wrote.
The judge also said Robert Bergner’s complaint hadn’t provided enough details to show that the county knew or should have known that Bergner was at an increased risk of suicide.
For example, the lawsuit alleged that another inmate saw marks on Bergner’s neck a day or two before his death, indicating a suicide attempt, and notified jail staff. But the lawsuit didn’t say how soon staff was notified and if they had enough time to respond.
In dismissing Colet’s lawsuit, Judge Breyer said the “allegations as to what defendants knew or should have known are too thin to give rise to liability.”
Hopeless, despair not enough
Even though Bergner had expressed hopelessness and despair, Breyer said, “It is several leaps from hopelessness or despair, which are surely common enough reactions to a conviction, to suicidal ideations that demand an immediate response.”
In response to the judge’s decision, Robert Bergner filed a revised lawsuit on July 15. The county responded on July 17 with another motion to dismiss, saying the revised lawsuit was essentially the same as the earlier complaint.
Colet filed a revised lawsuit on July 16; the county had not yet responded.
No Assistant Sheriff of Corrections since she’s been in office. Christy has Perea running corrections but he has zero experience. At one point she had the captains reporting to Victor as well. Broken elevators, no cpr training, the list goes on and on…… but hey she has time to serve ice cream to little kids in Fair Oaks.