When a person incarcerated at the federal detention center in Philadelphia is placed on suicide watch, they are assigned to the “dry cells” in the special housing unit to be monitored by guards.
It’s a system designed to keep vulnerable people safe from themselves.
But for a 35-year-old woman, the greatest threat in the cells in June 2024 wasn’t herself — it was corrections officer Michael Jefferson, who was assigned to her unit.
Jefferson admitted in federal court Wednesday he raped the woman, referred to as Jane Doe to protect her privacy, days after she arrived.
Jefferson pleaded guilty to aggravated sexual abuse, sexual abuse, sexual abuse of a ward, and one count of deprivation of rights under color of law for inflicting “cruel and unusual” punishment on the woman while she was incarcerated.
Three of those offenses carry a maximum sentence of life in federal prison. But the Justice Department agreed that if Jefferson pleaded guilty — sparing the woman from reliving the incident while testifying at trial — they’d not recommend a sentence longer than 30 years.
Jefferson was charged by federal indictment in May, nearly a year after the woman reported the incident the same day it happened.
In addition to the criminal case against Jefferson, Jane Doe is suing the federal government and Jefferson for negligence and emotional distress.
According to the civil lawsuit:
Jane Doe attempted to take her life while in en route to FDC Philadelphia in July 2024, so she was placed on suicide watch and housed in a “dry cell” in the special housing unit of FDC Philadelphia July 3, 2024.
Officers forced her to strip naked and took all her clothes, according to the lawsuit. She was isolated in a cell with only a blanket to cover herself as male correctional officers, including the man who would rape her, monitored her.
Male officers and even an incarcerated man assigned to cleaning duty were permitted to walk around outside her cell and look at her through the glass window, the lawsuit said.
There was no toilet in the cell; if she wanted to use the bathroom, she had to use a bedpan.
Following two days and multiple requests, prison officials gave her a jumper, t-shirt and underwear.
Throughout her time in her dry cell, Doe was supposed to be supervised by two to three officers. But Jefferson took a special interest in her, her lawsuit said, and kept checking in on her while she was sleeping.
The lawsuit said she woke up on her stomach in the early morning hours of July 6 to find Jefferson pressing down on her back, having locked himself in her cell.
“Please don’t,” she pleaded.
“Shut up,” Jefferson said before he raped her, the lawsuit said.
Jane Doe pretended to fall back asleep and waited two hours until shift change to report the assault. She completed a rape trauma kit, according to a Justice Department memo filed Thursday, which provided DNA evidence that helped secure the case’s resolution.
The victim’s civil lawsuit accuses the federal government of negligence.
There should have been at least another officer on-duty in the unit, according to the lawsuit; and they should have been able to hear the commotion. But nobody came to Jane Doe’s aid, the lawsuit said.
“This egregious sexual assault occurred only due to negligence, gross negligence, carelessness, and otherwise wrongful acts and omissions of Defendant United States of America and its agents…” the lawsuit said.
“Other (Bureau of Prison) officers who knew or should have known about Officer Jefferson’s sexual abuse permitted, condoned, or acquiesced to his misconduct.”
According to a Dec. 18 Justice Department memo explaining the allegations in reference to Jefferson’s plea, only two corrections officers had access to Jane Doe’s cell the night she said she was raped: Jefferson and his colleague, Daulton Hetzer.
Hetzer told investigators he and Jefferson “split up the shift” so that only one person would be watching the cells. He told investigators he was sitting in an office without a view of Jane Doe’s cell, listening to music, for half the shift.
“Appears to be asleep,” Jefferson wrote in a logbook every half hour when he was purportedly observing Jane Doe and the other people in the unit. Hetzer noted a lieutenant visited on his shift before promptly leaving.
Jefferson will be sentenced in the criminal case in April. The civil lawsuit is pending.
