Eugene Smith was allegedly drunk in public when he was arrested in September 2025 and taken to San Diego County jail.
He was supposed to be booked and released after sobering up. Instead, he died in his own waste after more than 50 hours in custody. He was not checked on regularly and he never received proper medical attention, an independent investigation has found.
“Per (body-worn camera) it appeared Smith was in pain and complained of bleeding,” said the Citizens’ Law Enforcement Review Board, or CLERB. “(The health care provider) missed an opportunity to clarify if Smith was complaining of a GI bleed, instead telling him, ‘You’re not bleeding at all, you’re not’.”
The Sheriff’s Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the findings, or what actions it might take as a result of the violations disclosed in the CLERB report.
Smith, who was one of 10 people to die in San Diego County jails last year, was described as a 55-year-old San Diego resident in a news release . Court records show a history of arrests for various infractions and misdemeanors. The Union-Tribune was unable to locate any of his relatives.
Ten more people died in custody so far this year, raising questions about whether the reforms instituted by Sheriff Kelly Martinez have done enough to reduce the historically high mortality rate.
The CLERB review of how Smith died appears to mischaracterize key time elements, including when he was medically evaluated and when he was moved from one cell to another.
For example, the report says Smith was moved and assessed by jail medical staff at approximately 2:30 a.m. on Oct. 2, 2025. The Sheriff’s Office said in a news release that Smith died at a nearby hospital more than an hour earlier.
But the CLERB investigation also found that deputies failed to conduct all of the regular safety checks required for every person in jail.
As two deputies encountered Smith in the hours before he died, they noticed the stench of human waste, the report said. One said “Jeez” and the other said “Oh smell,” it added.
“Despite those exclamations, neither deputy attempted to communicate with Smith other than calling out his name nor did they enter the cell to verify his condition,” CLERB said in its report.
Hours later, another deputy was seen on videotape looking at his cellphone while he was supposed to be conducting safety checks, the report said. He saw and also ignored the overwhelming smell, it added.
“When he reached Smith’s cell, Deputy 6 was heard audibly sighing and saying ‘Jesus Christ’ as he was looking into Smith’s cell,” the CLERB report said. “Deputy 6 remained at Smith’s cell for about eight seconds and then continued with his checks without attempting to make verbal contact with Smith.”
Some 30 minutes after that, other deputies assigned to move detainees in a nearby cell “smelled a strong odor of feces in the hallway and immediately determined it was coming from Smith’s cell,” the review board report said.
“As they looked inside a deputy exclaimed, ‘Oh my god’ and ‘Please be alive’,” it said. “The deputies entered Smith’s cell after he failed to respond to their calls … He was not breathing.”
The CLERB report said deputies described the condition of the cell, telling investigators about “observing dark colored feces that ‘didn’t look like normal feces’ and said, ‘there’s feces everywhere’.”
“Per BWC, there were dark, dried feces smeared on the floor around Smith’s torso and legs,” it said.
The citizens’ review board, which is scheduled to consider the findings at its monthly meeting tonight, is an advisory body. Its investigations are non-binding, and legally it can do little more than publicize reports and issue policy and disciplinary recommendations.
The Medical Examiner’s Office declared Smith’s cause of death as “acute peritonitis due to chronic pancreatitis with ruptured pancreatic pseudocyst.”
The condition is a dangerous inflammation of the membrane surrounding the inner abdominal wall. It generally is considered life-threatening and requires immediate medical treatment in a hospital setting.
The autopsy also cited hypertension, atherosclerosis and chronic drinking as contributing factors to Smith’s demise. The manner of death was listed as natural.
The CLERB investigation result came two months after Martinez appeared before the Board of Supervisors and declared that she had transformed the troubled jail system, which has averaged more than one death every month over the past two decades.
“We have changed our culture,” the sheriff told supervisors on Sept. 1. “It comes from the top down.”
Four more people died in her jails in the weeks after Martinez addressed the county board. Forty-two people have now died in custody since January 2023, when Martinez was sworn in as sheriff. Between 2005 and 2022, there were 223 in-custody deaths.
The jail deaths have prompted a wave of litigation that has cost taxpayers tens of millions of dollars in recent years, including a $16 million settlement for the 2022 death of Hayden Schuck and a $14 million payout to the family of Elisa Serna.
The CLERB investigation into Smith’s death also showed that he was held in a sobriety cell for more than 29 hours even though he had been classified as a book-and-release, meaning he would be let go rather than placed into jail housing.
“Due to IP (incarcerated person) Smith’s cooperation and conversations with deputies, it was determined that he would be fit to continue with the booking process,” the report said.
But Smith resisted being escorted into a medical evaluation cell and pulled away from deputies, investigators said. He was placed in handcuffs and a nurse was summoned to perform a medical assessment and vitals check, the report said.
The CLERB report does not say what if anything the nurse found. Rather, it says Smith was placed in waist chains and taken to be fingerprinted, where he alternated between being cooperative and resistive.
“At the conclusion of fingerprinting, deputies placed Smith into a temporary holding cell at about 2:52 a.m.,” the review board said. “Smith remained in the temporary holding cell for about 21 hours until he was discovered not breathing.”
In all, the CLERB investigation sustained four of five misconduct allegations related to various procedural violations related to the Smith death.
The claim that two deputies failed to properly check on Smith hours before he died was ruled “not sustained,” meaning the investigation failed to disclose sufficient evidence to prove or disprove the allegation.