The State of Nevada will pay $939,000 to settle a lawsuit brought by an incarcerated man who sued prison officials after he did not receive adequate care for back pain for years despite “waiting, suffering and begging for help.”

Charles Morris filed a federal lawsuit in 2018 accusing several state prison medical officials of “callous disregard for my personal health and wellbeing” after he was repeatedly denied back surgery that a doctor had deemed necessary. According to the lawsuit, Morris often waited months to receive sufficient care for his back, developed spasms that caused his legs to collapse and only received surgery after a fall in 2018 that left him partially paralyzed.

In August, a jury found three Nevada Department of Corrections (NDOC) officers liable and ordered a $1.25 million payout, but the state appealed the ruling. The sides agreed to a settlement of $939,000 earlier this year, and the deal was unanimously approved Tuesday by the state Board of Examiners, a panel composed of the governor, attorney general and secretary of state that approves major contracts and state spending decisions.

As part of the settlement, Morris agreed to drop two other pending lawsuits against the state. 

“No amount of money will make Mr. Morris whole. He is wheelchair bound in his 40’s due to the lack of medical care he was provided by NDOC,” Paola Armeni, Morris’ lawyer, said in a statement. “Nonetheless, the settlement will bring Mr. Morris some comfort for all that he has had to endure. Hopefully, the settlement will continue to be a reminder that inmates have a constitutional right to adequate medical care and just because they are incarcerated, they cannot be ignored.”

NDOC declined to comment.

It’s the latest state payout related to misconduct by correctional officers. Last year, the state paid $3.4 million to a man who also alleged inadequate medical treatment, and in 2023, it reached two seven-figure settlements related to the use of birdshot rounds in correctional facilities.

In its response to Morris’ lawsuit, the state denied many of the allegations, including that they were responsible for the escalating back pain and delayed necessary treatment. They also acknowledged that they were not privy to many of the accusations raised, such as Morris’ lingering health concerns, but reiterated that he did receive some medical care for his back.

Morris, who is serving life in prison with the possibility of parole for the 1998 murder of a UNR cheerleader, first started to complain of back pain in 2000. He was moved to a new facility for this pain, and an X-ray in 2008 found vertebrae misalignment and other structural abnormalities, with a doctor ordering an MRI, according to the lawsuit.

However, he did not receive an MRI until eight years later — prison staff rebuffed his attempts to receive one — which confirmed the vertebrae misalignment as well as disk and nerve impingement issues, according to the lawsuit. A doctor said surgery was the only way to fix the problem, but Morris’ attempts to receive surgery went nowhere.

“The pain feels like being stabbed in the back,” Morris wrote in his requests for surgery, according to the suit. “When I make any type of movement, it feels like my back is going to break.”

At one point, a grievance he filed for an immediate surgery was denied because of a wait for outside medical appointments, which Morris said in his suit represented a failure to dedicate financial resources toward inmates’ medical needs.

In 2018, his legs collapsed and he fell down the stairs at the Northern Nevada Correctional Center in Carson City. He was then transported to a hospital, where he received surgery for his back. 

The fall resulted in him being partially paralyzed on his left side. He also still has nerve damage and was told he might never regain full mobility, which he argued would not have been the case if his back was treated earlier.

“[It] caused me unnecessary emotional and mental distress in knowing I was ignored and caused to endure this major surgery, no rehabilitation, lasting pain, and may never fully recover,” he wrote in a court filing.