Man under observation in SF jail dies, family demands answers

Jorge Macay, 41, died while purportedly under medical observation at a San Francisco jail on Wednesday. His family thinks the jail — and the city — failed to care for the man who was in their charge. 

Macay, according to the Sheriff’s Department, was brought into County Jail 2 in San Francisco on Sunday, Feb. 12, after he was arrested following a  domestic dispute call by neighbors. By Wednesday, he was dead in his cell. 

Sheriff’s spokesperson Tara Moriarty confirmed Macay was under observation. Macay was “assessed at intake and was offered medical care and treatment appropriate to the medical issues identified at their intake assessment,” Moriarty said.  

Macay’s girlfriend, Ileana Velez, said this meant he was put in solitary confinement. Velez, 31, said she spoke with Macay on the phone on Monday, the day after he was taken into custody. 

“He just kept saying he was so cold,” said Velez. Around midday on Wednesday, Maccay was found unresponsive in his cell. 

Velez said the recent times that Macay had been jailed, he was given Librium, a drug used to treat alcoholism and anxiety. Librium is also known to slow or stop breathing and heart rates. 

“They gave him that. But that was messing with his emotions … he’s already unstable, as far as that goes,” Velez said, adding that while Macay used methamphetamine, he was not a drinker and had no need for alcohol withdrawal medication.

The last time Macay was jailed and given Librium, Velez said he told her that “he felt like somebody was sitting on his chest.” The guards wouldn’t come to the cell when he called for help, Macay told Velez, so he got their attention by picking a fight with his cellmate. 

Macay’s son, Jorge Macay, Jr., remembered his father telling him the same story.

Regardless of what caused Macay’s death, Velez said that, in her experience, the cells would have had camera surveillance. And Velez, Macay, Jr. and Macay’s sister, Karina Macay, said whoever was in charge should have been watching more closely. 

“He didn’t die from being injured, he died because somebody dropped the ball and was not monitoring him the way they should have been,” Karina said. 

Karina, Macay’s older sister, said she received a call from the medical examiner’s office later on Wednesday, and was given preliminary information about her brother’s sudden death. 

“He was in, I guess, the detox unit,” Karina said. She was told by the medical examiner that her brother was “under medical observation” and seen at 11:30 that morning. “He was fine, supposedly.” 

Then when officers checked his cell at noon, Karina said, “They said that he was found unresponsive and with a faint pulse.” Medical personnel tried to resuscitate Macay, but Karina was told that he was pronounced dead around 12:45 p.m. 

This left Macay’s sister with many unanswered questions. 

“I want to know: What drugs was he on, first of all? What were you guys giving him to mitigate his withdrawal, or whatever was going on? What kind of medical monitoring were you doing?” Karina asked. “Why did my brother walk into that jail and leave in a body bag?” 

The sheriff’s department, Karina said, still had not contacted her about her brother’s death, two days later.

“They should be on top of that type of stuff,” said Jorge Macay, Jr., who wasn’t sure whether his father was given medication, acquired drugs in jail, or died from withdrawal symptoms. “That’s their whole job, to babysit you.”

Macay isn’t the only person to die in county jail in recent years. According to Sheriff’s Department records, one county jail inmate died by suicide in late 2022, and another died of suicide in January, 2021.

Macay was no stranger to jail; he had been on parole for many years, and was in and out of custody several times. 

Growing up in San Francisco in the 1980s, Karina Macay said that she and her two brothers “grew up rough” with two parents who struggled with drug addiction, and their mother landing in prison. Their father, battling his own substance abuse issues, left the children with their grandmother in Daly City. 

When their mother got out of prison, Karina said she and her siblings were reunited with her and lived together again. But after their mother died in 2001, when Jorge Macay was 20, Karina said her brother was never the same. 

“Sometimes you become a product of your environment,” she said. “It was hard for him, especially after my mom died. It seemed like drugs is what helped him get through it. He didn’t know how to cope with it, you know? And then after that, he was just kind of lost, and in and out of prison … and I just tried to love him through it.” 

Now, Jorge Macay, Jr., Macay’s eldest son, is 22, around the same age that Macay was when his mother died from drug complications. His two younger children are 12 and 7. 

“Addiction doesn’t get fixed with jail time. It doesn’t get fixed going to prison. It doesn’t get fixed by being picked up on a violation and just being put back in that pod,” Karina said. “They failed him. And not only did they fail him, he died under their care this time.” 

In 2011, Macay sued the sheriff’s department, accusing a deputy of beating him up while in custody. His attorney, John Burris, said he reached a settlement with the department. Velez, Macay’s girlfriend, worried that bad blood between Macay and San Francisco law enforcement could mean that he didn’t receive adequate care while in custody. 

But even those who meant to help Macay along the way may not have done enough. Karina remembered attending her brother’s graduation from a Walden House drug program, and realizing her brother was high during the ceremony. 

“I couldn’t believe it, I looked at that place and it was just like, ‘The fuck is wrong with you people?’” Karina asked. “I know he has to want it, but he wasn’t even given the tools to be able to … try to do it.” 

Though she took care of her younger brother for a long time, Karina said their relationship grew rocky in recent years, and she hadn’t seen him in a while. 

On Monday, having heard that he was in jail again, Karina went to visit Macay; it was their late mother’s birthday. She was told she couldn’t see her brother because of the Covid-19 protocols, even though the sheriff’s deputies she saw working there apparently took few covid precautions and were unmasked. 

In the past year, Velez said Macay had been trying to turn things around. He would proactively go see his parole officer instead of being arrested, and he would test clean. 

Jorge Macay, Jr. said his father struggled his whole life, but unlike the “typical drug abuser,” always did his best to take care of his children.

Doria Torres, a longtime friend of Macay’s, said she recently noticed Macay’s efforts and had just started working with him to help find him a job. Torres works for Hunters Point Family, a nonprofit that helps formerly incarcerated or homeless people find employment. 

“I was waiting for him to start doing that … Working with Jorge, you gotta do one thing at a time with him,” Torres said. “He still had his downfalls, but he was trying.”  

Now, Macay’s family hopes to change the system. 

“My brother’s death is not going to be in vain,” Karina said, her voice trembling. “And if he died so that we could do this, and we can change some things and bring it to light, and save other people’s lives and make the system a little bit better? Then I’m okay with that.” 

The family has started a fundraiser to support Jorge Macay’s children, pay for funeral services, and hire an attorney to investigate his death.