of execution than that. >> good evening, i'm joie chen. crime and punishment, they go together, that's understood. but when the punishment involves brutality, neglect, even torture, something has gone terribly wrong with our criminal justice system. cruel an unusual punishment, not only unconscionable, it's unconstitutional. "america tonight" looks at three stories about away can go wrong behind bars. we begin with the largest jail in the country, run by the los angeles police department. shockingly: the jailers themselves had been accused of criminal behavior about. not only the friends and relatives who come and visits. "america tonight"'s michael okwu reports. >> at that point i'm lying face down with my face on the ground, my hands behind my back and i have about four or five officers come around me. and then i hear this crack. >> that's what happens says leo figueroa. when he went to visit his brother. at one of the most notorious jail in america, the men's central jail in los angeles. he got a phone call from his younger brother juan, arrested and being held at the jail. juan, a veteran of desert storm. you adjusting to life after leaving the army. he had had a few minor scrapes with the law but they didn't amount to much. what figueroa heard left him stunned. >> your brother calls you from jail tells you his teeth are busted? and what else? >> that his ribs are broken. >> did he give you any indication in that phone call how he sustained those injuries? >> los angeles sheriffs. >> that the los angeles sheriffs had in fact hurt him? >> yes. >> and did you believe that? >> yes. >> figueroa went to the jail hoping to see his brother. after getting away he calls the run around, he approached a deputy in the waiting area, so began his ordeal at the hands of the los angeles police department. >> i heard stop resisting, stop resisting, i yelled out, i'm in handcuffs. >> this is an x ray of figueroa's arm. >> how is your arm now? >> this is my left arm, the strength in it is very weak. >> is there still pain? >> yes. >> the jail system run by the los angeles county sheriffs department is the largest in the country. critics say it's also one of the worst. a place where beatings and broken bones are a part of the disciplining of inmates and culture of the area, condoned by the department's brats including the sheriff lee baca. baca stepped down in late january. baca's resignation was hastened after federal authorities recently announced charges against 18 officers who worked at the jail. figueroa's story is one of several recounted in the indictments. after leo figueroa was injured he was questioned by a supervisor in charge of the visitors area. sergeant eric gonzalez. gonzalez repeatedly pressed figueroa suggesting he was responsible for the attack. >> at some point you were told to leave? >> i was not told to leave. if i was told to leave i would have left. i was backing away from the officer. >> why did you back away? >> the officer says, i'm not going to do anything for you. >> did you have that tone of voice with the officer? >> no, that's what they're telling me. >> add one point the officer even handled arm. >> it appears to be -- >> ahhh! >> pain in the left arm red and swelling. >> according to one of the federal indictments, gonzalez didn't like it when visitors disrespected deputies. so he encouraged those under his command to conduct unreasonable searches and seizures , unusual force and unlawful arrest. figueroa was held for five days. >> i didn't do anything to the deputies that i was involved with and they know that. the bottom line is they know that. >> it wasn't just jailhouse visitors like figueroa who were mistreated by deputies. the indictments make clear, inmates were harshly treated as well. >> we're looking at a young gentleman who was a pretrial detainee at los angeles county jail and was brutally beaten by three deputies. >> sonia makado is a civil rights attorney who has represented several inmates . >> his face is beaten to a pulp. >> his eyes were black and blue and shut for a month and his ankle was broken in four different parts. >> what did he do to provoke this kind of beating? >> he didn't do anything to provoke that kind of beating. >> in their depositions, deputies contend that when searching the man's sell he became unruly. but they admit at the time of the beating he was unarmed, dressed only in his underwear and was being physically detained when many of the beatings were rendered. sheriffs deputies could be heard joking about the man's injuries. >> he is fine. he was talking right now. >> if you are difficult in jail you will be disciplined. everyone assumes that. >> that's right. >> why should we care if these nments arinmates are discipline? >> if you are difficult in jail, you should be disciplined, but the punishment shouldn't be i just get to beat you. because you took a flashlight that's 40 ounces and you beat his ankle until it broke in four or five different places. that is not punishment, that is brutality. >> after suing the sheriff's department and the officers involved, the jury unanimously awarded the plaintiff $125,000. the deputies involved also agreed to pay $165,000 in punitive penalties. the sheriff's department wouldn't comment on that case or mr. figueroa, and sheriff baca's office declined our request for an interview. >> just maintain the building. >> however, we were given a tour of the men's central jail. by the man who was sent here to clean things up. captain daniel dyer oversees day-to-day operations at the jail. he has been on the job for seven months. >> what was your first reaction when you heard there were guards that were physically abusing not only some of the inmates but the visitors of those inmates. >> you know, disbelief. >> he blames a lot of the problems on poor morale, saying officers regarded working at the jail as a temporary stop to more glamorous job in the rest of the department. >> how critical is your job here to develop relationships with the inmates? >> you get the respect and most of my staff have come to realize that and the rapport with the deputies and the inmates is remarkable, it really is. >> is there abuse happening at this jail or has abuse in the past happened at this jail? >> we had problems back then as rampant as some of the media pour trays it? no. i have outstanding men and women who come in here every day. they work with some of the toughest l.a. street criminals. >> i'm sure you've got great, dedicated people but you know, it sounds a little bit like spin when you say that it might have been overblown by the media. we're talking about 18 separate individuals here. >> no, there's no doubt here. >> current and past. that's a lot of folk. >> is a lot of folks. and there are some serious allegations, and we take each one of those extremely series. we've done a lot of things since then. i've almost doubled my supervision, we've changed protocols when it comes to force. basically, we've gone back to drawing board on a few things. >> as for leo figueroa, the judge awarded him $325,000 for his ordeal. he has also awarded him more than $120,000 in medical costs. he has been working towards a master's degree. in the end, though, figueroa says what's most important is that the truth of what happened to him is finally coming out so that a stay or even just a visit to the l.a. county jail is no longer a life-threatening experience. >> coming up on "america tonight," states are farming out prison medical care but at what cost? >> and so they decided that the best thing to do with this would be to pack it with kitchen sugar. >> sugar? >> sugar. >> these protestors have decided that today they will be arrested >> these people have chased a president from power, they've torn down a state... >> what's clear is that people don't just need protection, they need assistance. >> welcome back. arizona leads a growing trend, a in prisons, it is one of 30 states to privatize its prison systems, a goal to cuss costs. but a new record finds that that can lead to negligence and, for some, tragedy. this is "america tonight"'s adam may. >> rylan clarine is a five month old happy and healthy baby girl. she lives with her grandmother jody and the rest of the family in the spall farming town of safford, arizona. it is a four hour drive and a world away from where she was born at the state prison complex in goodyear, arizona. her mother reagan is still there. >> this is a beautiful picture we took together. >> two years ago when reagan was 18 years old she was arrested for having prescription painkillers illegally and charged with possessing for sale. the court sent her to prison, where she started dating rylan's father, she was sentenced to prison, two and a half years behind bars . >> how did reagan react when she found out that she was going to be sentenced to two and a half years, and she's pregnant at the same time? >> reagan is very -- she holds her emotions very well. but once she's talking to me alone, it's you know a complete devastation. >> reporter: but that was just the beginning. reagan was transferred from county jail to perryville state prison where jody says her daughter was denied prenatal care. >> and the baby was born small? >> yes, small. and you know, it just infuriates me. >> after 48 hours in labor, reagan had to have a c section. and jody says the medical staff didn't stitch the wound shut. they just dressed it with butterfly bandages. >> they sent her back to the prison. but by about day 3 she's noticing it's oozing, it's not looking right, it's looking looking infected. >> jody said it was getting worse. >> to be able to look certified her body was just freak hing her out. and she would just sit and cry and say please please take me to a hospital. you know? i feed them to stitch it up. it needs to be closed. and they told her, if you come back we're going to start giving you tickets. >> and a ticket is a bad behavior notification? >> it's a bad behavior notification. i truly believe i could have lost my daughter had they not given her antibiotics prior. >> jody said two weeks later they finally brought her to the hospital inside the prison. but her daughter's ordeal was not over yet. >> they decided she had been there long enough, she could go to her yard. but it was still open a little bit. and so they decided that the best thing to do with this would be to pack it with kitchen sugar. >> sugar? >> sugar and we are talking about that -- they donate it from mcdonald's, burger king, they are standing there opening little packets of sugar filling that wound packing it in with what's left. >> sugar from a fast food restaurant? >> yes. >> sugar was used to treat wounds before the advent of antibiotics, back in the early 1900s, but it is no longer considered acceptable practice. "america tonight" asked them to comment but they refused. -- declined. in the middle of the conversation with jody, reagan called home. >> hi, hone. >> reagan, my name is adam may, i'm going to ask you a few questions. after you had the c section what happened to you? >> after, i found out it was coming open. so i needed to be seen right away. >> back up for a second. how big was the wound? >> it was big enough for me to be able to put my fist in it. the worst pain i ever have been through in my life. >> reagan confirmed the details about what her mother had told us about the kitchen sugar. >> they were ripping open packages of kitchen sugar and putting it in the wound. >> what do you think needs to be done here? >> i don't know. what we say doesn't really matter. >> reagan is not the only inmate alleging mistreatment. the aclu filed a class action lawsuit against the arizona prison system. it allegation that prisoners are at, quote, substantial risk of pain, amputation, disfigurement and death. >> the general attitude and far too many in this society is who cares? >> dan pikoda of arizona's aclu, says in his 40 year career he has never seen a worst prison health care system. a year and a half ago, the state handed over prison health care to a private for-profit company. >> the arizona legislature, in the last few years, the main goal has been to reduce the costs that are attributable to the prison function. people are often sent to prison for a two-year three-year sentence that turned into death sentence because of the absence of basic minimal care. >> coming up here. states are running out of drugs for lethal injections and scrambling for alternatives. is it a death sentence or is it torture? >> he was gasping for breath, making guttural sounds, he was strange against the restraints which were holding >> there's an ongoing crisis in the criminal justice system. prisons are running out of the lethal drugs needed to perform executions. and are turning to some experimental substitutions. in an exclusive story, the family of one executed prisoner, resulted in a very cruel and unusual death. "america tonight"'s chris bury reports. >> christopher sepulvado has been on death row for 20 years. lawyer argued that the state planned to experiment on the 70-year-old condemned man. >> we believe there's going to be a serious risk that there will be plain and suffering that is unavoidable that will be inflicted on mr. sepulvado and it shouldn't be. >> pain and suffering is what the family of condemned prisoner dennis mcguire claimed he endured during his execution last month. mcguire was convicted in 1994, for the rape and murder of a pregnant newlywed. the system had run out of lethal drugs. the sedative medazalam and the drug hydromorphone. drugs that no state had ever used before. in an exclusive interview with "america tonight," mcguire's son says he feared what might happen with ohio's new lethal cocktail. >> he had a feeling that something was going to go wrong. the doctors had told him something was going to happen. he had a feeling, he just had a gut feeling that something was going to go wrong during the execution. >> that gut feeling became a dshed opportunity out t -- turned out to be a valued prem -- a valid premonition. >> we expected him to go to sleep, that's what we expected. >> i've seen about 18 and this differed drastically. >> he had never seen an execution anything like it. >> this one was different because after three to four minutes dennis mcguire began gasping for breath, his stomach deeply. he was making a snorting sound, almost a choking sound at times. i didn't notice it at first but his left hand which had been waving at his kids had clenched into a fist. >> i noticed my watch, it was about 10:31, 10:32 a.m. i had difficulty seeing the exact time because i was crying at the time. >> mcguire's son read from an affidavit about exactly what he saw in a death chamber. >> he then made a noise that sounded like he was fighting for air and grunting at the same time. it was extremely loud. while this was happening, the warden and the guard in the white shirt had horrified looks on their faces. it appeared that they were shocked with the way it was happening. >> one of his lawyers had asked him to put on a big show but he had refused. a claim that ohio officials could not substantiate. now mcguire's family is filing a lawsuit to stop ohio from using the drug combination that killed him, arguing that it amounts to cruel and unusual punishment. >> when you strap somebody to a board, deprive them of oxygen for 25 minutes as they slowly die in front of their family, it would take a good imagination to come up with a more brutal form of execution than that. >> and mcguire said they used his father as a test subject for an experimental drug combination. >> i believe that my dad shouldn't have been an experiment. i believe they shouldn't have experimented with anybody let alone my father. >> that states such as ohio and louisiana are having trouble finding lethal injection drugs is no accident. major pharmaceutical companies have stopped shipping them to american prisons. they buckled under pressure of death penalty opponents including reprieve, based in london. >> it is a problem for them. it is a massive ethical problem. it is also a pr problem, it's also a commercial problem for them. >> so state prison started acquiring the drugs in secret, sometimes oversees. in 2012, nebraska was trying to execute michael ryan, but had trouble to acquire sodium thiopentyl. here at the nebraska state prison, authorities were unable to acquire that lethal drug for the state's first execution after abolishing the electric chair. the chief chemist said she was ordered to obtain it from outside the country which means it would have been a violation of fda rules. pharmacist diane booker who left her job in 2011 asked us not to show her face. >> what did your boss tell you to do? >> to acquire sodium thiopental by any means possible. >> and by any means possible, you took that to mean? >> any source possible, outside the united states. >> because it was not legal here? >> the last manufacturer in the united states stopped making it yes. >> what was his response? >> even though you can't get it, it is not fda approved, you can't possibly use it for execution. >> booker says her boss ignored her objections and obtained the drug from a foreign broker. nebraska would not comment. now, prisons are turning to compounding pharmacies. nebraska refused to reveal exactly where they're getting their lethal drugs. >> the secrecy allows them to -- it draws a curtain and says you don't need to look over here, it's not important, move open. we're saying it's not that simple, and we need to see, because we're killing somebody in the name of the state of louisiana. and all of the citizens. >> in january, louisiana prison officials revealed a new execution protocol after acknowledging they could not get pentobarbitol, the drug louisiana has used before. so they added the combination of medazilam and pentobarbitol. the same drug that killed mcguire in ohio. with drugs never before tried for that purpose should be reason to prevent other executions like it, according to the lawsuit his family is bringing. >> that no other family went through what we had to do, that no other family in the united states had to deal with what we had to deal with, what we had to witness. >> the last minute stay of accusation, gives sepulvado's lawyers 90 days to prove that ohio's bungled execution can be, too, cruel and unusual punishment. >> thanks for joining us for this special edition of "america tonight." if you would like to comment on anything you have seen here tonight log on >> every day across america, military-style raids are taking place. local police dressed like soldiers break down doors in the hunt for drugs. >> this is not what we think of as police in a democratic society. this is way out of proportion. >> in the past, police "swat teams" were only used in extreme circumstances. now, they're increasingly sent on routine tasks.