Justin Matthews was a 19-year-old Rockford native when he found himself in the Winnebago County jail facing murder charges.
He had been arrested on September 8th, 2017, on a 3 million dollar bond.
By January 20th, 2018, Justin was in his third month in jail. He was in a cell by himself when Winnebago County Corrections officer Larson found Justin dead in his cell.
Larson allegedly found Justin had hanged himself with a thermal T-shirt between 5:00-5:15 am.
The Matthews family filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Winnebago County alleging Justin’s death could have and should have been prevented.
It has been alleged that the Corrections officers were withholding Justin’s medication.
Craig Sanderg, the family’s hired attorney, said Justin had a history of attempts and should not have been left alone in a room with “hanging points”.
The county voted to settle the case for $400,000 after it was determined by their lawyers that going to trial would be even more costly.
This was the first alleged suicide to be investigated by the Integrity Task Force.
It was the third deadly force incident with Tom McNamara in mayoral office and the 16th deadly force incident in the 2010’s.
This was the fourteenth case investigated and justified by the Winnebago Boone County Integrity Task Force.