When Amber Marchand and LaCrisha Cate arrived at the Okanogan County jail in 2023, both were booked while awaiting trial and both died in custody within three months, according to lawsuits filed by their families. The suits allege that jail staff failed to provide adequate treatment for opioid withdrawal and did not implement sufficient suicide-prevention measures, while the jail used care practices families and outside clinicians say were not proven to treat severe withdrawal.
Marchand, a Colville Tribes citizen, died by suicide in April 2023 after she repeatedly asked for help with symptoms tied to opioid withdrawal, the lawsuit filed on her behalf said. The filing says she spent days in the jail while her symptoms continued, with jail staff providing responses the family argues were insufficient for the risks she faced.
Separately, Cate died in August 2023 after guards found her unresponsive in a shower at the Okanogan County jail, according to the lawsuit described in the Associated Press report. The report says Cate was cold to the touch when she was found, and that she had been lying in the shower area for hours. The filing describes Cate as a mother and a dancer who never woke up.
The lawsuits also point to how the jail handled opioid withdrawal. In Marchand’s case, the filing alleges that after she told staff she was experiencing opioid withdrawal and requested medication-assisted treatment, she did not receive medication in time and her calls for help went unanswered, while she remained in custody under supervision restrictions that the family says increased risk. In Cate’s case, the lawsuit alleges she was instead placed on the jail’s standard withdrawal approach after she reported she had consumed fentanyl and experienced “withdrawal,” and that this approach relied on medications and other measures that the lawsuit and medical experts say do not treat opioid withdrawal symptoms as effectively as FDA-approved medications used for opioid use disorder.
The filings argue the jail used practices that conflicted with standards tied to state funding for medication for incarcerated people with opioid use disorder. The report says Okanogan County received a state grant under a program intended to ensure a jail provides FDA-approved medications shown to alleviate severe withdrawal symptoms, but that records reviewed in connection with the lawsuit show the county provided a de facto “opiate withdrawal protocol” that used other treatments instead—listing options such as Gatorade, ibuprofen, an antihistamine, an anti-nausea medication and a blood pressure medication.
Mandy Owens, a clinical psychologist and assistant professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine’s Addictions, Drugs and Alcohol Institute, was quoted by the Associated Press as describing the standard-setting work for the grant program. Owens said the jail was supposed to be adhering to those standards to receive the funding, according to the report.
The deaths of Cate and Marchand also intensified scrutiny of Okanogan County’s procedures, lawyers for the families said, arguing the jail repeatedly fell short on inmate safety checks and medical response. The Associated Press report said that auditors had previously raised concerns about the jail’s ability to monitor people in areas where inmates could have privacy to conceal safety risks, and that the recommendations from a 2017 state Department of Corrections audit had not been implemented by the time of the later deaths.
The lawsuits say both women were among a group of people whose deaths or serious injuries at the jail, including Colville Tribal members, were linked to similar failures since 2011. The report says the families are suing Okanogan County and jail staff for alleged civil-rights violations, including claims that Marchand was left alone while detoxing in an area where it was difficult to monitor her for safety and where the family says suicide prevention was inadequate.
The Associated Press report said the Okanogan County Sheriff’s Office declined to comment on the deaths, citing pending litigation, and did not respond to questions sent to it. It also said Washington law requires jails to publish reports within 120 days following unexpected deaths, and that Okanogan County had not published reports more than two years after the deaths, according to a state database cited in the story.
Beyond the individual cases, the families’ lawyers tied the lawsuits to calls for statewide jail standards and oversight. The report says lawyers for the families called on state lawmakers to pass enforceable statewide requirements for opioid withdrawal management and suicide prevention in jails, arguing the current approach—where facilities rely partly on voluntary adoption of guidelines—leaves people in custody vulnerable.
For Marchand’s family, the lawsuit and interviews described the continuing pressure on policymakers to respond. For Cate’s mother, the Associated Press report said she spoke about her grief and about the aim of preventing future deaths of Indigenous people inside the jail, including by urging state action to increase oversight of local jails and improve addiction treatment and safety measures.
The Okanogan County jail deaths of Marchand and Cate have therefore become part of a broader dispute over whether Washington’s jail system adequately manages opioid withdrawal and suicide risk, and whether counties can meet those obligations without stronger state oversight, according to the families’ allegations and the public-records context described in the Associated Press report.