Ex-Inmate Sues County Over Loss of Foot : Court: The plaintiff says jail-issued sandals that he was forced to wear for seven days led to the amputation. He seeks compensation.

Jose Miguel Trujillo’s right foot used to be flesh and blood. Now it is plastic, and he is blaming the Ventura County Jail.

Trujillo has sued the county in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, alleging that the jail-issue sandals he was forced to wear for seven days caused an infection so severe that doctors had to amputate his foot last July. Trujillo said the infection never healed because diabetes has left his legs with poor circulation.

Within the next 10 days, the suit will be served on the county, said Trujillo’s attorney, George Kezios.

County Risk Manager Robi Klein declined Friday to comment on the suit.

Trujillo, 38, of Port Hueneme, said he barely remembers the four days he spent on morphine in the Ventura County Medical Center’s intensive care unit after the amputation last summer. But he remembers how his life used to be.

“I say to God, ‘Thank you, I’ve got my life, but I still need my foot,’ ” Trujillo said Friday. “I need it for swimming. I need it for driving my truck. I need it for riding my motorcycle. I need it to play with my friends, my people, my home boys. They say, ‘What happened with your foot?’ They don’t believe it.”

What happened began in 1988. Trujillo was charged with violating probation on a 1986 drug-possession sentence after police pulled over his truck and found heroin in the pocket of one of his passengers.

Trujillo was sentenced to 280 hours of community service for the probation violation because the judge didn’t want a diabetic to serve jail time, said his wife, Maria Rojas.

But Trujillo decided to fight the sentence. The poor circulation in his legs caused him considerable pain after he served the first six hours of his community service on a state highway crew.

The case was reassigned to Superior Court Judge Charles McGrath, who instead gave Trujillo a 30-day jail sentence, beginning March 30, 1989.

Trujillo got the standard prison-issue uniform: light blue cotton shirt and pants, white socks and beige rubber sandals.

“As soon as I went in, I let them know the shoes were rubbing against my toes,” Trujillo said.

The deputies told him to send up a “kite,” jail slang for a request to see the doctor, Trujillo said. The doctor prescribed that he wear tennis shoes that were less irritating, but sheriff’s deputies refused to issue them, Trujillo’s suit claims.

His foot became infected. As it got worse, deputies continued refusing to issue the shoes and merely told him to send up more kites, Trujillo said.

Jail Commander Bob Brooks said Friday that Trujillo was hospitalized in the jail infirmary on April 7, 1989, but ignored doctors’ instructions to keep his foot elevated.

But Brooks also said there is no record that tennis shoes were ever issued to Trujillo in accordance with the doctor’s prescription.

Trujillo was released from jail on April 16, but his foot did not heal and instead became gangrenous.

By July, after all other medical treatment had failed, doctors told him that he could lose the foot or lose his life.

He agreed to lose the foot. They amputated it and sent him home.

Trujillo was bitter for months and “did nothing but cry,” his wife said.

Now he feels a little stronger, a little less bitter, but angrier than before, Trujillo said.

He has been walking on his artificial foot for about a month. But he is unable to work and help his wife, who is awaiting a kidney transplant and undergoes dialysis regularly. They are living on her $630-a-month Social Security benefits and the utility cutoff notices began piling up this week, Rojas said.

“I understand now better the inside of the county jail. I would like to show the judge,” Trujillo said, taking off his false foot and plunking it on the floor. “THIS is your 30 days in jail.”

He added bitterly, “Tell him to give me a check for a little money. He needs to understand what happened to me.”