California county to pay $480K to inmate who miscarried after deputies stopped for coffee

SANTA ANA, Calif. - A Southern California county must pay $480,000 to an inmate who lost her pregnancy after sheriff’s deputies stopped to get coffee while driving her to a hospital.

On Tuesday, the Orange County Board of Supervisors agreed to settle the federal lawsuit filed by Sandra Quinones, 34.

Quinones, 28 at the time she was in custody, alleged that jail staff delayed medical treatment after her water broke in her cell on March 28, 2016.

Jail staff took two hours to respond to Quinones’ call for help, the suit said.

Instead of calling an ambulance, sheriff's deputies drove Quinones to the hospital in a patrol car, then "acted in further deliberate indifference" to her medical needs by stopping at a Starbucks on the way, according to the complaint.

"This poor woman, she’s in jail having a miscarriage and, instead of calling an ambulance, they take her to the hospital in a patrol car and the cops stop at Starbucks while she’s bleeding," Richard Herman, Quinones’ attorney, told the Los Angeles Times.

Quinones was hospitalized and her baby did not survive.

A federal court dismissed her case in October 2020 but was reinstated by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals the following year, according to the LA Times.