ST. MARTIN PARISH — Ashton Segura’s husband, Nicholas Boutte, has been incarcerated at St. Martin Parish Jail for three weeks. In a phone call with KATC and Segura, he described the conditions at the jail as unlivable.
“In my pod we have about four people sleeping on the floor," Boutte said.
"Every time someone new comes in here, they’re coming in here with no spoons, cups, to eat or drink. Whenever they do give them a mattress, it's pieces of a mattress. It's not a whole mattress. Half the time, they're not getting bars to take a shower with, no towels.”
Boutte said he only received a mat because another person was released.
“My first week and a half over here, I was sleeping on the cold iron on the rack, just a rack with a sheet laid down on the middle,” Boutte said. “I got a bruise on my hip.”
Segura said when she heard of her husband’s condition, she called the warden to voice her concerns.
“I would call up there they say they’d get the situation handled and they never did,” Segura said.
“I talk to him every day and every time I’m on the phone with him I hear them saying ‘someone asked for a mat last night.’ They bought him three pieces to a mat and told him to put it together.”
I contacted St. Martin Parish Sheriff’s Office Public Information Officer Ginny Higgins, who forwarded my questions to the corrections department.
Higgins said the department said no one is sleeping on the floor, which is the first time she’s heard this.
Segura’s cousin said he knows a handful of those incarcerated and wants to see a change.
“The officers, the COs, the sergeants, down to everybody that works there, employed by the St. Martin Parish, they're not doing their job right,” Segura’s cousin said.
Boutte was arrested in St. Martin Parish for aggravated flight from an officer, resisting an officer, aggravated obstruction of a highway, operating a vehicle with a suspended license, running a stop sign and careless operation.
He's still in jail due to having a detainer out of Iberia Parish.
KATC called IPSO and found that the detainer is due to the following warrants:
Failure to appear (FTA) for failure to pay child support
FTA theft
FTA no license plate/switched license plate, aggravated flight from an officer.
FTA trial for aggravated criminal damage to property
FTA flight from an officer where human life was endangered
FTA simple criminal damage to property
