A Lowndes County woman who was sexually assaulted in the Monroe County Detention Center has filed a lawsuit against Monroe County and the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office.
Brandy Degaris has called for a jury trial to determine what damages she can receive for her treatment during the three years she was incarcerated at the detention center where she had sexual relations with former jailer James Doyle Adams.
Degaris filed the lawsuit with the Monroe County Circuit Court Tuesday, naming Adams and Sheriff Cecil Cantrell in the lawsuit. She claims, in the suit, that Adams had sex with her while she was an inmate in 2013, and the MCSO “created an unreasonable risk of harm to the plaintiffs for failing to adequately train and supervise their employees.”
Degaris located at least two other women who claimed they were harassed or sexually assaulted while incarcerated in the Monroe County Detention Center, according to the lawsuit. The suit lists 12 Jane Does who were detainees that were allegedly sexually assaulted or approached by deputies at the detention center.
As an inmate in the detention center, Degaris was legally unable to consent to sexual encounters with Adams. Degaris was incarcerated for alleged aggravated assault, a charge she was acquitted of in 2016.
Degaris’ attorney Mark Cliett was on vacation and did not answer calls from The Dispatch by press time.
Adams was arrested and sentenced to five years in prison with five suspended in 2014 for having sex with an inmate while he was a jailer, according to Monroe County records. He is now a registered sex offender.
Cantrell confirmed to The Dispatch Adams had sex with Degaris when she was an inmate in 2013 or 2014 but said he didn’t know about the lawsuit. He said he is unsure how long Adams had worked at the detention center before the incident occurred.
“When we found out that he did that, he admitted it,” Cantrell said. “We took him and her to polygraph them, and to make a long story short, during the polygraph, he told us that he had done that, so we fired him, and then we took him in front of the grand jury and had him indicted.”
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