A military veteran serving a prison sentence for robbing a pharmacy is expected to be released early after state prison officials reportedly bungled his medical treatment.
The Snake River Correctional Institution, photographed on Aug. 25, 2019.
Bradley W. Parks/OPB
On New Year’s Eve, a visiting judge to Malheur County Circuit Court wrote that Snake River Correctional Institution repeatedly failed to treat 43-year-old Michael LaSeur’s back injuries from military combat and his PTSD. The court had previously ruled the prison needed to provide better treatment to LaSeur.
While “some improvements” had been made, Judge Patricia Sullivan said in her judgment the prison still fell short of the court’s orders. Sullivan wrote that LaSeur should be freed to get proper treatment at a Veterans Affairs hospital.
A final decision is expected to follow a hearing on Monday. It’s unclear if Oregon Department of Justice officials will oppose the judge’s proposal. Justice department officials declined to comment.
LaSeur and his attorney, Tara Herivel, said they are optimistic he’ll be released. The combat veteran said he plans to get treatment in Pennsylvania, where he will also care for his ailing mother.
“My biggest priority is getting out and taking care of my mom,” said LaSeur, whose 11-year sentence was set to conclude this spring.
LaSeur became addicted to prescription opiates after withstanding a pair of explosions while serving a combat tour in the Middle East, his attorney said. He required multiple surgeries for pain in his neck and back.
After attempting to quit painkillers cold turkey, LaSeur said, he became suicidal.
“I was going to ride a motorcycle into a brick wall. And I just happened to go into a store that had a pharmacy. I was going to get my favorite soda, go out in the parking lot, drink it, smoke a couple cigarettes and then end my life,” LaSeur said in an interview.
After noticing the pharmacy, LaSeur said, he pivoted to robbing it for painkillers. He robbed the pharmacy three times between Nov. 29, 2013 and Jan. 7, 2014. He pled guilty to three first-degree robbery convictions, court records show.
He had no criminal history prior, Herivel noted.
“He came into prison with some pretty serious injuries,” Herivel said. LaSeur asked for treatment for both his physical injuries and post-traumatic stress disorder but went unheard, she said.
LaSeur eventually filed a habeas corpus petition, contending that the prison conditions violated his constitutional rights. Herivel eventually became LaSeur’s court-appointed attorney.
Court filings show that Malheur County Circuit Court judges sided with LaSeur on several — but not all — claims for better treatment. For example, a judge in 2023 ordered an MRI for LaSeur’s back and access to the drug gabapentin for his back pain.
Yet, according to Sullivan’s latest court filings, prison officials have fallen short. Treatment plans for his back pain have been slow, the judge wrote, and prison officials “for some unexplained and inexplicable reason” denied LaSeur access to an orthopedic pillow.
LaSeur also received “little of the treatment for PTSD ordered by the court,” Sullivan wrote.
Releasing prisoners for inadequate medical treatment is rare, Herivel said, but it has happened before.
In 2021, a Umatilla County Circuit Court judge ordered Two Rivers Correctional Institution to release a convicted armed robber 12 years early for failing to treat his pain or give him access to physical therapy. The man, Anthony White, had paralyzed legs after being shot in the back during the robbery.
Between that case and LaSeur’s, Herivel said, state prison officials should be taking more seriously the care of people in their custody.
“I think most people would agree that the punishment is the (prison) sentence,” Herivel said. “The punishment is not to die by medical neglect, to die by psychiatric crisis, to die by being attacked and assaulted by other prisoners or staff. We cannot neglect people who are going to be coming back into the community.”