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ST. LOUIS — Faulty locks and understaffing at the city’s downtown jail are partially to blame for a beating two years ago in which three men were punched, kicked and stomped in the head by fellow inmates while corrections officers failed to intervene for hours, according to a lawsuit filed last week.

Throughout 2021, inmates at the City Justice Center repeatedly took advantage of faulty locks to break out of their cells and shatter windows, destroy equipment and set fires at the jail. And because of those faulty locks, the lawsuit claims, inmates who were not supposed to be in the recreation area broke out of their cells one night in mid-August and beat their fellow detainees, which was captured in a widely circulated video.

Now, Stanley Miller, Robert Childs and Zachary Kearnes are seeking compensation from the city, jail leadership and unnamed employees in a federal lawsuit in which they claim their rights were violated when they were left unprotected from other detainees with violent histories.

“It’s a big problem beyond these three folks,� said local attorney Elad Gross, who sued on behalf of the men who were beaten. Gross has previously filed other lawsuits over public records and conditions at the jail.

A city spokesman did not respond to a request for comment about the lawsuit.

Issues have plagued the downtown jail since 2021, when detainees first began escaping their cells by jamming them with trash and debris. Inmates on several occasions destroyed parts of the jail in protest of conditions at the facility and court shutdowns related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Video of the Aug. 13, 2021, beating showed officers standing outside the door of the recreation room during the beatings. Maj. Tonya Henry, the jail’s security chief, said at the time that “another situation� was happening at the same time “and my staff was pretty much spread thin.�

She said the handful of officers shown in the video didn’t have the equipment necessary to stop the fight.

Around 11:30 p.m. that night, the fight broke out when an inmate began punching Kearnes in the face. Several corrections officers locked the doors and stood by as detainees attacked Childs, then Miller, the suit says.

Additional backup officers arrived, but they continued to watch as beatings continued. At 11:51 p.m., an employee spoke to the inmates through a window and said, “We’ll be in there in a minute,� but it took them roughly 25 minutes to extract Kearnes. Childs and Miller were left inside, according to court documents.

At around 2:15 a.m., officers entered the recreation area again and used pepper spray as detainees rushed toward the officers, the suit says. Childs and Miller were finally taken from the recreation area and transported to University Hospital.

Kearnes was diagnosed with a traumatic head injury, damaged teeth and swelling around his eyes. He required additional dental work and still experiences anxiety and other mental health problems, according to court documents.

Childs had injuries to his face, back and head and continues to suffer from back pain, inflammation, nerve pain, loss of feeling in his legs, and urination and bowel issues. Miller likely had a concussion.

In September 2022, Gross sued the city for Missouri Sunshine Law violations alleging officials failed to provide him requested emails, texts and reports as he tried to research the assaults on the three men. That lawsuit is ongoing.

But Gross said Monday he hopes the new litigation will convince the city to correct ongoing dangerous conditions at the jail. The city is still working on repairing the locks roughly two years after the attacks. An official said in May they hoped to be finished by the end of 2023.

“Certainly we hope the city will be making changes and this hopefully will benefit other people,� Gross said.

A hearing has not yet been set in the case.