The Georgia Board of Regents agreed to a $1 million settlement to resolve the claims of a mother whose son spent three years in a near-comatose state before dying following a suicide attempt at the Georgia State Prison in Reidsville. 

Attorney Robin Clark, who represents the mother of Nicholas Baldwin, said the state and the defendant in companion litigation, prison health care provider MHM Correctional Services, settled all claims against them following a mediation in August.

The amount MHM paid is confidential, Clark said.  

The Robin Frazer Clark P.C. principal, a former president of the State Bar of Georgia, said the case "is one of the saddest, most depressing cases I have ever handled in my 31 years of practicing law."    

Baldwin was 17 when he attempted to kill himself in 2014 after pleading guilty to a 2012 armed robbery.

Baldwin had a history of mental illness and suicide attempts, according to court filings, and had been scheduled for an "emergency" psychiatric referral a few days before corrections officers found him hanging by a bedsheet in his cell.

Court filings said Baldwin may have remained hanging for as long as 30 minutes while officers went in search of video equipment and discussed what to do before they finally got him down and discovered he was still alive.  

Prison staff administered CPR and used a portable defibrillator on Baldwin, who was unconscious but breathing and reportedly had a stable heartbeat.

Even so, a physician assistant at the medical unit administered a shot of epinephrine, which sent Baldwin into cardiac arrest.

He was again resuscitated but never achieved more than "minimal" consciousness as a result of an anoxic brain injury he suffered. Baldwin remained in full-time care facilities until he died on Nov. 7, exactly three years after attempting to take his life. 

"He was 20 years old when he died," Clark said. "He would have gotten out of prison at age 27."

Clark and Stone Mountain attorney Gerald Lupa—who died last year—sued on behalf of Baldwin's mother Debra Baldwin in 2016. The two-pronged litigation included federal claims of psychiatric and medical malpractice against the state BOR's Georgia Regents Medical Associates over the actions of its employees, a mental health counselor and the prison doctor and PA who administered the epinephrine.

The complaint included constitutional claims against several of the correctional officers and prison staffers. 

Baldwin also filed claims for psychiatric malpractice against MHM, which employed the prison's mental health director. That suit was filed in Fulton County then transferred to Tattnall County Superior Court.

There was a global mediation of all claims in August before Gino Brogdon Sr. with Henning Mediation and Arbitration, during which the settlements were reached. 

All the funds have been paid, Clark said. 

Bendin Sumrall & Ladner partner David Johnson, who represented HMH, did not have permission to discuss the settlement.

A spokeswoman for state Attorney General Chris Carr declined to comment.