Tarrant jail inmate, 68, with medical issues dies at hospital, Sheriff’s Office says

Read the latest in our coverage of the death of Anthony Johnson Jr. and other issues in Tarrant County jail.

A 68-year-old Tarrant County Jail inmate who authorities say had a history of medical issues died in custody Friday at a Fort Worth hospital, the Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release.

McLendon Caldwell died at John Peter Smith Hospital. He had been transported to JPS multiple times for ongoing medical issues since being booked into the jail in February, according to the Sheriff’s Office.

The Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s Office will release his cause of death.

Caldwell was arrested in June 2023 by Fort Worth police on a charge of harassment of a public servant, a third-degree felony. According to court records, he was accused of causing a Fort Worth police officer to come into contact with “the saliva of the defendant, any other person, or an animal.”

Caldwell was sentenced in December to three years of probation with deferred adjudication as part of a plea agreement. But he was re-arrested in February after his probation was revoked, according to court documents. It’s unclear why authorities revoked his probation.

All in-custody deaths are reviewed and investigated by Tarrant County Sheriff’s Office jail staff, the TCSO Criminal Investigations Division, an outside law enforcement agency, JPS medical staff, the Texas Commission on Jail Standards, the Tarrant County Medical Examiner’s Office and the Texas Attorney General’s Office, according to the release.

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