Alvis Shrewsbury turned himself in to a West Virginia jail after being charged with second-degree DUI. Nineteen days later, he was dead, Insider reports.
Shrewsbury communicated with his family while he was in jail, but as the days went on, his appearance began to trouble them.
"After we were talking to him on the 10th (of September), he'd already been beaten. His face was black," his daughter Miranda Smith said, according to WBTV.
"He said, 'Mom if I don't come home, I love you. I want you to know I love you," mother Anna Shrewsbury said.
"He was telling us about his ribs being broken. It was hard to breathe. He hadn't had a bowel movement in over a week and nothing was being done about it. He was calling the nurse's station for help," Smith said.
His family was informed last weekend that Shrewsbury had died after jail staff transported him to a regional hospital.
Reports say Shrewsbury's body is in the custody of the West Virginia Office of the Chief Medical Examiner and the family plans to conduct an independent autopsy.
