WARNING: This article discusses suicide and contains an image of an Aboriginal person who has passed.
The mother of a Noongar man who died in a Perth prison on Friday said she begged authorities for help in the weeks leading up to his passing.
Ricky-Lee Cound was found unresponsive by officers in his Hakea prison cell on Friday evening.
Prison officers and medical staff tried to resuscitate him before paramedics arrived and continued first aid while transporting him to hospital.
Mr Cound was initially transferred to Hakea following his alleged involvement in riots at Acacia prison last month.
His mother, Laura, says she reached out to Hakea a fortnight ago to beg for help for her son and was advised to speak with the Aboriginal Visitors Scheme about concerns he was being mistreated in the punishment unit.
"They failed him with a lack of duty of care. He was in his cell screaming out for help," she said.
“I have already buried a daughter. Now I gotta bury a son that could have been saved. No one listened to me. No one heard me cry out for help. I rang everywhere."
Ricky's girlfriend Bethany McShane said she was the last person to speak to him while alive.
Noongar man Ricky-Lee Cound was found unresponsive in a cell at Hakea prison on Friday. Source: Supplied
“After the riot he was crying out for help and started hurting himself," she said.
“On the day it happened he told them that he wanted to go to crisis care because he was feeling suicidal. They ignored him and anyone else that told them.”
Ngalla Maya CEO Mervyn Eades, who provides support to current and former prisoners, says he also reached out to the suicide prevention task force a fortnight ago expressing his concerns for the men being placed in lockdown as punishment following the Acacia riots.
He said his messages to the department went unactioned.
"We warned them that this could happen. The mistreatment and abuse that has happened is unforgivable and there has to be accountability. This young man lost his life due to their lack of duty of care," he said.
“If they would have listened or if they cared it would have been preventable.
“It has become a pattern with this unit. Locking them down in the punishment unit for up to 23 hours a day. The young ones cannot cope.”
Ricky-Lee's death is the fifth Aboriginal death in custody so far this year.
The family of Ricky-Lee Cound spoke out following the 22-year-old's death in Hakea prison last week. Source: NITV News: Aaron Fernandes
“This has gone way too far after the first person. Five is absolutely catastrophic and it is at crisis level. This department has shown we can lose someone and it is business as usual,” said the Suicide Prevention and Trauma Recovery Project's Megan Krakouer
“The fact that there was contact on the 12th of March from his mother makes me wonder if any contact had been made. I wonder if there was any support offered to this young man and others."
The WA Department of Corrections provided a statement to NITV News.
"The circumstances of the death at Hakea Prison are being investigated by police and will be the subject of a Coronial Inquest and as such, it is not appropriate to comment further," it read.
