MILPITAS — Investigators are looking into the death of an inmate at a county jail housing unit this week, authorities said.
According to a statement Friday evening by a Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office spokesperson, San Jose police booked a 65-year-old man into the county’s Main Jail on Tuesday after San Jose police arrested him on suspicion of multiple charges of aggravated sexual assault of a child.
Shortly before 2:05 p.m. Thursday, deputies carrying out welfare checks at the county’s Elmwood jail found the man unresponsive inside a cell where he had been held alone.
Deputies and other first responders began providing emergency life-saving measures before paramedics and Milpitas Fire Department firefighters arrived at 2:15 p.m. and took the man to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 2:52 p.m., the spokesman said. His identity was not disclosed, pending notification of next-of-kin.
Preliminary results of an investigation by sheriff’s detectives found the death appeared to have been by suicide. The sheriff’s office said it will follow its in-custody death protocol, opening a joint investigation with the county district attorney and medical examiner-coroner’s offices.
Contact George Kelly at 408-859-5180.