Demonstrators pledge to continue daily protests in Winston-Salem until they get answers on John Neville's death

Triad Abolition Project and the Unity Coalition are the lead organizers of the protests. Demonstrators have called for transparency and accused Forsyth County District Attorney Jim O'Neill and Sheriff Bobby Kimbrough of a cover-up. O'Neill and Kimbrough have denied those allegations. The protesters also have a list of specific questions about Neville's death that they say O'Neill and Kimbrough have not answered, including questions about changes in policies at the jail.

Neville died of a brain injury at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center on Dec. 4, three days after Kernersville police arrested him on an outstanding warrant for assaulting a female in Guilford County. Exactly 24 hours after being placed in the Forsyth County Jail, Neville suffered a seizure while he was asleep and fell out of the top bunk to the concrete floor of his cell.

The autopsy report said Neville's brain injury came about after his heart stopped beating. He asphyxiated while being restrained with his arms behind his back and his legs folded in a hog-tie position. Neville said he couldn't breathe at least 10 times, and at least twice, the response from detention officers was, "Come on buddy, if you can talk, you can breathe," according to three independent sources. He was revived several times, at the jail and in the hospital, before eventually going into a coma and dying.

Five former detention officers and a nurse have been charged with involuntary manslaughter -- Lt. Lavette Maria Williams, 47; Cpl. Edward Joseph Roussel, 50; Officer Christopher Bryan Stamper, 42; Officer Antonio Woodley Jr., 26; Officer Sarah Elizabeth Poole, 36; and nurse Michelle Heughins, 44. The detention officers were scheduled to appear in Forsyth District Court on Thursday, but their cases have been continued to Nov. 6. Heughins is scheduled to appear in court on July 30, but her case will likely be continued as well to November. 

The ACLU of North Carolina is supporting the protests, according to Citlaly Mora, a spokeswoman for the group.

"The sheriff and the DA have a responsibility to answer the questions and respond to the community," she said Thursday in a brief phone interview. "We are fully encouraging those calls. It's a reflection of the movements that we're seeing in North Carolina for police reform, defunding the police and calls for police accountability that we haven't seen previously."

More than 30 demonstrators stood in the rain, many holding signs and banners, including one that had a painted portrait of John Neville. Directly behind the speakers was a banner across a tent protesters have used before. That banner says, "Blood is on your hands Kimbrough and O'Neill."

Kimbrough did not publicly acknowledge Neville's death until June 26, prompted by questions from the Winston-Salem Journal. Kimbrough has said he did not mention Neville's death publicly at the request of Neville's family members and their attorneys, Michael Grace and Chris Clifton. Kimbrough also said he kept quiet about Neville's death because of an investigation he had requested by the State Bureau of Investigation and also because he didn't know what caused Neville's death until July 7, when the autopsy was finalized. 

The protesters have accused Grace and Clifton of having a conflict of interest because the law firm has represented sheriff's office deputies on behalf of the Police Benevolent Association and because Grace and Clifton are friends with Kimbrough. 

Clifton said just because he's friends with Kimbrough doesn't mean there's a conflict. He's friends with prosecutors, judges and law-enforcement officials and that doesn't keep him from vigorously defending the rights of the people he represents, he said.

"He's a leader and a good man and somebody that I personally have admired for a long time and known professionally for two decades," Clifton said. "That doesn't mean he's not going to do his job and I'm not going to do mine."

There is jail surveillance video and body-camera footage of the incident that led to Neville's death but it has not been released publicly. The footage is not considered public record, and the News & Observer of Raleigh has filed a petition for its release. Triad Abolition Project and the Unity Coalition have not specifically asked for the video to be released publicly.

Kimbrough also said the office has changed policies regarding the duty to intervene and starting on Aug. 1, 50 detention officers, including members of the jail’s special response team, will undergo medical training. He said that the medical provider, Wellpath (formerly Correct Care Solutions), is one of the only corporations that provide medical care in jails. Wellpath has been sued several times over deaths of inmates at the Forsyth County Jail, including two men who died in May 2017.

Speakers, including Battle, Bailey Pittenger and Chad Armstrong, said Thursday that they question whether justice will be done in Neville's case, even though involuntary manslaughter charges have been filed against the detention officers and the nurse.

They referred to the death of jail inmate Shon McClain in Wake County. According to the News & Observer, McClain died of neck and head injuries after a Wake County detention officer slammed McClain into a floor twice. 

The officer, Markeith Council, got 90 days in jail and three years of probation after he was convicted of involuntary manslaughter, the paper reported.