It took hours for guards at a D.C. jail to respond to an incarcerated individual who repeatedly threatened to kill himself before ultimately starting an electrical fire in his cell, according to a lawsuit filed Monday.
The complaint, filed by five current and former inmates at the Central Detention Facility in Southeast D.C., said staff at the jail did not properly respond to the man’s cries or multiple fires he set during the 2023 incident. They are seeking an unspecified amount of money in damages.
The five inmates each suffered excessive smoke inhalation and significant psychological distress, according to the complaint filed in D.C. Superior Court.
After yelling for help overnight, the man lit pieces of paper and fabric on fire and pushed them out of his cell into the hallway. Flames burned on and off for nearly an hour while staff stood by, the complaint said.
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“I thought that the officers were going to let us burn alive,” Noah Summers, one of the five men suing, said in a statement. “We all banged on our doors, and nobody came for hours.”
They claim staff didn’t intervene as the man dragged an electric box fan into his cell, starting an electric fire which blanketed the area with thick, black smoke. Shortly after the fire started, a guard used a fire extinguisher to douse the flames and inmates in the unit were evacuated through a smoky hallway, the complaint said.
The men were all housed in the facility’s mental health unit at the time of the fire. Two are still at the Central Detention Facility, two are in the federal prison system and one lives at a residential treatment program in the District.
Part of the complaint has been redacted to protect internal jail records.
The lawsuit also claims the D.C. Department of Corrections failed to properly train and supervise staff, leading to mishandling of the incident. A report from the D.C. Auditor’s Office released in May 2025 found “inadequate staff training,” among other issues, impacted the well-being and safety of inmates in D.C. jails.
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