Crime & Safety
Autopsy: Jailed Child-Molest Convict Died Of Natural Causes
Thomas Richard Heaven, 82, of San Diego died last spring while awaiting sentencing for child-sex-abuse crimes.
SAN DIEGO, CA — Postmortem tests have determined that an 82-year-old jail inmate who died last spring while awaiting sentencing for child-sex-abuse crimes succumbed to natural causes, authorities reported Thursday.
The county Medical Examiner's Office has ruled that Thomas Richard Heaven of San Diego died of sepsis due to a bloodstream infection, with type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular ailments and pulmonary disease acting as contributing factors.
On March 17, two months before he was scheduled to be sentenced on several counts of committing lewd and lascivious acts on a person under age 14, Heaven was transported from San Diego Central Jail to a hospital due to low blood pressure and a high heart rate, sheriff's Lt. Juan Marquez said.
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Three weeks later, Heaven was transferred to another local medical center, where his condition deteriorated due to low oxygen levels prior to his April 24 death, according to sheriff's officials.
"The San Diego Sheriff's Office extends our sympathies to the Heaven family and all those affected by Mr. Heaven's passing," Marquez said. "A sheriff's family-liaison officer will continue to support the family as they navigate through this difficult time."
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The Sheriff's Office, which runs the county's jails, has been under scrutiny for years due its unusually high number of in-custody deaths. In 2022, the California State Auditor's Office found "deficiencies with how the (county agency) provides care for and protects incarcerated individuals (that) likely contributed to in-custody deaths."
That audit examined 185 deaths within the San Diego-area jail system from 2006 through 2020, a rate that exceeded all of California's other large counties during the same period. Nineteen in-custody deaths occurred in the county in 2022 alone, and another six took place in 2023.
The Sheriff's Office has committed to a $500 million effort to modernize and upgrade its jails, but critics have questioned whether those efforts have been sufficient to address the problem of custody deaths.
— City News Service
