Wexford Health Lawsuits: Verdicts, Settlements, and Class Actions

Wexford Health Sources, the Pittsburgh-based company that provides medical care inside jails and prisons across the United States, has faced a steady stream of lawsuits alleging that its cost-cutting practices leave incarcerated people without adequate treatment. Recent Wexford Health lawsuits include a certified federal class action over denial of opioid addiction medication in West Virginia, multi-million-dollar jury verdicts in Illinois over delayed surgeries, and more than $3.3 million in settlements in New Mexico between 2022 and 2024. In Illinois, where the company operated under a federal consent decree for years, the state ended its relationship with Wexford in July 2025.

How Wexford’s Care Decisions Get Made

Wexford has provided correctional healthcare since 1992 and holds contracts in states including Illinois, West Virginia, New Mexico, and Arizona.¹ A single internal process sits at the center of most lawsuits against the company: the “collegial review.” Each week, a facility’s medical director calls a corporate utilization management physician in Pittsburgh to seek approval for referrals to outside specialists and surgeries.²

Dr. Stephen Ritz, Wexford’s Chief Medical Officer since 2020, has been on the Pittsburgh end of many of those calls. He has testified that 85 to 90 percent of collegial reviews result in approval.³ Plaintiffs across multiple states have characterized the process differently, arguing it delays or denies care to save money.

The Opioid Medication Class Action in West Virginia

The largest active case against Wexford is Spurlock v. Wexford Health Sources, Inc., filed in July 2023 in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of West Virginia. Plaintiffs allege Wexford maintained a blanket policy of denying Medication for Opioid Use Disorder (MOUD) to incarcerated people, including those who arrived with valid prescriptions for methadone or buprenorphine.⁴ The complaint estimates the refusal saved the company roughly $62.4 million per year for every 10,000 patients denied treatment.⁵

On July 24, 2025, U.S. District Judge Robert C. Chambers certified two classes: a damages class for individuals denied continuation of their MOUD or proper screening, and an injunctive relief class seeking policy changes. Wexford had argued it lacked a uniform anti-MOUD policy and that identifying class members would require examining each person’s medical history. Judge Chambers rejected that argument, finding Wexford’s own intake records — drug tests, prescription verifications, and diagnoses — could identify class members.⁵

The case covers individuals at over 100 correctional facilities served by Wexford and is proceeding toward trial. Plaintiffs are represented by Berger Montague, Tycko & Zavareei, Calwell Luce diTrapano, and Forbes Law Offices.⁶

Illinois: Consent Decree, Deaths, and a Lost Contract

Wexford’s longest and most litigated relationship was with Illinois. In 2017, a federal judge certified a class in Lippert v. Jeffreys, a case alleging that medical care in Illinois prisons was so deficient it violated the Eighth Amendment. The state settled in 2019 and agreed to a consent decree requiring staffing, record-keeping, and policy improvements under a court-appointed monitor.⁷

The monitor’s eighth report, filed in early 2025, described physician staffing as at a 50 percent vacancy rate, a level called “dangerous” and linked to increased patient deaths in mortality reviews. Supervisory nursing positions were 67 percent vacant. A 2023 facility assessment found that only 3 of 27 Illinois prison medical units were fully operational.⁸ In May 2026, U.S. District Judge Jorge Alonso extended the consent decree and court monitoring for another five years, citing Wexford’s failure to meet policy deadlines, continued administration of incorrect medications, and the staffing crisis.⁹

A 2024 federal court filing reviewed 107 deaths in Illinois prisons and identified nearly 900 issues with how those cases were handled, including patients found malnourished after death.¹⁰ An earlier 2018 expert report analyzing 33 prison deaths found 12 preventable and seven more potentially preventable.⁹

One of those deaths generated a separate lawsuit. Michael Broadway, 51, died on June 19, 2024, at Stateville Correctional Center during a heat wave. An autopsy identified bronchial asthma as the cause, with heat stress as a significant contributing condition.¹¹ A wrongful death suit filed in November 2024 alleges staff placed Broadway in the highest and hottest gallery despite knowing about his severe asthma, that an industrial fan outside his cell was padlocked and unused, and that a nurse initially refused to climb the stairs to his cell because it was “too hot.”¹²

The Illinois Department of Corrections awarded Wexford a 10-year, $4 billion contract in 2023, but the deal never took effect. IDOC revoked its selection after negotiations stalled, stating the proposed contract “would not provide for consideration of all factors of significance to the State.” An emergency contract with Centurion Health took over on July 30, 2025.¹⁰¹³

Recent Jury Verdicts Against Wexford

Antonio Hunter: $5 Million

In June 2025, an eight-person federal jury in East St. Louis awarded $5 million to Antonio Hunter, a former Pinckneyville Correctional Center prisoner who suffered from rectal prolapse. The jury found Dr. Stephen Ritz had been deliberately indifferent by refusing to approve a surgical consultation through collegial review.¹⁴ Hunter was first denied a referral in 2018 and his condition worsened over years of severe daily pain. Surgery was approved only after he filed a civil rights lawsuit in 2021, and he was released in July 2022 without ever receiving corrective surgery while incarcerated.¹⁵ The award included $4 million in compensatory and $1 million in punitive damages. The court denied Ritz’s post-trial motion to overturn the verdict.¹⁶

Reco Reed: $822,210

In April 2023, a jury in the Southern District of Illinois awarded $750,000 to Reco Reed, who was diagnosed with a right inguinal hernia in March 2017 at Centralia Correctional Center. Reed reported worsening pain nine times across two facilities over the following year, but Dr. Dennis Larson refused to refer him for surgery. The procedure was not performed until September 2018 — 18 months after diagnosis — and Reed suffered complications that required a second operation. With attorney fees and costs, the total judgment reached $822,210. The court denied Wexford’s request to overturn the verdict in April 2024.¹⁷

New Mexico Settlements

Wexford was rehired by the New Mexico Corrections Department in October 2019 and in November 2024 signed a new four-year contract valued between $286.5 million and $317.8 million. A February 2025 investigation documented over $3.3 million in identified settlements involving Wexford in New Mexico between 2022 and 2024.¹⁸

Hillhouse v. Wexford, $750,000, settled June 2024, over allegations that Wexford failed to diagnose and treat cancer for a patient at the Central New Mexico Correctional Facility between 2021 and 2023.
Mathis v. Wexford, $640,000, settled May 2024, over the death of Jonathan Cisneros, a 37-year-old with a history of mental illness and suicide attempts. He told staff he planned to end his life, allegedly had his antipsychotic medication reduced, was not properly monitored, and was found hanging in his cell in June 2021.
Mathis v. Wexford, $562,500, settled 2023, for the wrongful death of Gilbert Chacon.
Hallum v. Wexford, $550,000, settled 2023, over allegations that medical neglect led to heart failure.¹⁸

In fiscal year 2023, Wexford incurred $3.1 million in sanctions from New Mexico for staffing shortages alone. The state’s contract with Wexford does not require the company to disclose litigation information to corrections officials.¹⁸

Cases Wexford Has Won

Not every lawsuit against Wexford has succeeded. The Eighth Amendment standard prisoners must meet is exceptionally high. The Seventh Circuit has described deliberate indifference as requiring proof that a defendant was “essentially criminally reckless,” a bar well beyond negligence or even gross negligence.¹⁹

In Feazell v. Wexford Health Sources, decided in June 2025, the Seventh Circuit affirmed judgment for Wexford against a Pontiac Correctional Center prisoner who alleged the collegial review process caused unconstitutional delays in treating his hemorrhoids and anemia. The court found the plaintiff produced no expert evidence that the delays departed from accepted medical standards.²⁰ In Barnes v. Wexford, decided in June 2026, the same court ruled Wexford could not face corporate liability under the Monell doctrine when no individual provider was found to have committed a constitutional violation.²¹ And in Sanders v. Moss, decided in August 2025, the court ruled against a prisoner who said his mental health deteriorated during eight years in solitary confinement at Pontiac, finding that the provider’s treatment decisions amounted at most to a difference of medical opinion.¹⁹

Earlier Controversies

Wexford’s legal history is not limited to medical care disputes. In Mississippi, the company was accused of funneling consulting fees to a former state legislator to bribe a corrections commissioner, and the state recovered $4 million from Wexford in a lawsuit brought under Mississippi’s RICO Act.²² In Illinois, a former corrections director was sentenced to two years in prison in 2008 for accepting $50,000 in bribes from lobbyists, including a Wexford lobbyist.⁹ A 2009 New Mexico legislative audit found “gaping holes” in Wexford’s healthcare delivery, with one lawmaker characterizing the level of care as “torture.”¹⁸

Wexford’s own website states that the company maintains “one of the lowest litigation rates in the industry.”¹

1
Wexford Health Sources. Wexford Health Sources
2
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3
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4
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WBEZ Chicago. A Man Incarcerated at Stateville Prison Died During a Heat Wave. Now His Family Is Suing
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Shaw Local News Network. Lawsuit Filed Over Inmate’s Death at Stateville Correctional Center in Crest Hill
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Illinois Department of Corrections. Updated Transition of Comprehensive Healthcare Services Provider Memo
14
Loevy & Loevy. Antonio Hunter $5 Million Verdict Press Release
15
GovInfo. Hunter v. Illinois Department of Corrections, Summary Judgment Order
16
Midpage. Hunter v. Illinois Department of Corrections
17
Prison Legal News. Illinois Prisoner Awarded Over $822,000 for Hernia Care Denied by Wexford Health
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Prison Legal News. New Mexico Corrections Department Continues Pattern of Abuse With Contract Medical Provider Wexford Health Sources
19
Prison Legal News. Seventh Circuit Rules Against Prisoner’s Deliberate Indifference Claim Over Wexford Health’s Poor Psychiatric Care
20
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21
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News From the States. Why Private Medical Contractor Has Fallen Under Scrutiny for How It Treats Prisoners