Settlement Reached in Cowling Lawsuit

LONGVIEW — A settlement has been reached in a wrongful death lawsuit involving an inmate who died in the Gregg County Jail. According to KETK and the Longview News-Journal, the settlement was reached late Tuesday at a mediator’s office. That means a trial set for January 22 in a Marshall federal courtroom is now canceled. There was no immediate word on terms of the settlement. The jury was to decide whether Gregg County was to blame for the 2010 death of Amy Lynn Cowling.

Cowling was 33 when she was brought to the Gregg County Jail Christmas Eve, after a traffic stop revealed two out-of-county misdemeanor theft warrants and some unpaid tickets. She died in a separation cell December 28. Defense attorney Robert Davis told the panel during the selection process that Cowling’s cause of death was “…a product of having abused drugs for years.”

A recovering opiate addict of seven years, Cowling was under a methadone regimen prescribed by a drug-addiction clinic in Tyler. She also was taking prescription medications. Those drugs, including the methadone, are not on the list of approved medications allowed by jail policy. Cowling’s family claimed the seizures and inability to communicate into which she lapsed were the result of withdrawal from her prescribed medications. Five jailers were fired or reassigned after the death.