Lee County Sheriff’s Office corrections deputy dies of COVID-19

A Lee County Sheriff’s Office corrections deputy has died in the line of duty from complications of COVID-19, according to Sheriff Carmine Marceno.

Marceno said in a statement Tuesday:

“I am incredibly saddened to announce the passing of another Lee County Sheriff’s Office family member in the line of duty.

Deputy Sheriff First Class William Diaz passed away early this morning due to complications stemming from COVID-19,” Marceno said in a statement.

Diaz, 29, joined the Lee County Sheriff’s Office in 2018 and spent three years as a corrections deputy.

Diaz is the second deputy to die in three weeks from COVID-19 complications.

Steven Mazzotta, who also worked in the corrections bureau, died on Aug.16. The agency held a ceremony for Mazzotta 10 days ago.

“You always want to think can I do anything better,” Marceno said. “Can I protect my family members better? Can I do something different? Again it crushes my heart that we are looking now for another sendoff for a hero which is going to be in the upcoming days so my thoughts are with their family because of their family to me.”

The Lee County Sheriff’s Office does not have a vaccine mandate, but Marceno encouraged his employees to get the vaccine in a letter he sent across the agency on Tuesday.

Marceno is vaccinated.

“It crushes my heart when I sit here and talk to you about the loss of one of my family members,” Marceno said. “He had his whole life ahead of him at 29 years old. Not that it’s good at any age but it’s so young so it really hits home.”

Marceno said the agency is doing everything it can to keep the jail safe.

“We have a company that comes in and we spray the jail constantly to kill any kind of disease or COVD,” Marceno said. “If we have patients that are incarcerated we isolate them so they can get treated and again we contain so it doesn’t spread so we do everything we possibly can. We really do.”

The Lee County NAACP toured the jail.

“What we found was that everything that’s being said to us we could actually see,” said Lee County NAACP President James Muwakkil. “We saw the quarantine quads. We also saw where the inmates were trying to practice what looks like some type of social distancing.”

Memorial services for Diaz are forthcoming and being planned with the family.