Female Inmate Dies While in Custody at the Comal County Jail

(New Braunfels, TX) -- An investigation is under way following the death of a woman at the Comal County Jail. The woman, identified as 50-year old Shana D’Lynn Wicall, was in custody at the Comal County Jail, and awaiting transfer into the state prison system, when she was found unresponsive during a cell check by jail staff on March 29th.

New Braunfels EMS was immediately called to the scene, and they transported the woman to Christus New Braunfels Hospital where she was also unresponsive to treatment. That’s when she was pronounced dead by Pct. 3 Justice of the Peace Mike Rust.

Wicall was in jail and awaiting transfer to state prison after she pled guilty on March 15th to violating her probation on an earlier 3rd degree felony charge (from 2007) of causing an accident with injury or death. After she pled guilty to that probation violation, County Court at Law Judge Charles Ramsay sentenced her to 3-years in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice prison system. But, again, she died while in custody here in Comal County.

An autopsy has been ordered, and preliminary results indicate that she died from a pre-existing medical condition, although detectives say they are still waiting on the final autopsy results. As with any death of an inmate while in custody, the Texas Attorney General’s Office and the State Commission on Jail Standards were notified of the incident.

According to an obituary printed in the Amarillo Globe News, Wicall, who hails from Dalhart, Texas, was a member of the Texas Junior Hereford Association as a teenager, and was named Texas Hereford Queen in 1979 at the age of 18. She is survived by a daughter, her parents, and a brother and sister. Funeral services were held earlier this week in Dalhart.