TOPEKA — The governor, attorney general and bipartisan leaders of the Legislature agreed to a $275,000 settlement of a lawsuit filed against the Kansas Department of Corrections by the estate of Gary Raburn after he was strangled in a cell at Lansing Correctional Facility.
Attorney General Kris Kobach recommended the State Finance Council make the deal to end the suit filed in Leavenworth County District Court.
In 2024, Gov. Laura Kelly, Senate President Ty Masterson, House Speaker Dan Hawkins and others on the State Finance Council endorsed a separate $150,000 payment to Raburn’s estate to remove state prison health provider Centurion of Kansas from the lawsuit.
The Kansas Bureau of Investigation ruled Raburn’s death in 2023 was a homicide after determining he had been strangled in a two-person cell at Lansing. He was housed with Ladarious Racquez Barkers, who has been charged with capital murder.
Before the attack on Raburn, Barkers had been the subject of dozens of state prison disciplinary reports, including instances of assault, battery, arson, theft, fighting and inciting a riot while incarcerated at El Dorado, Hutchinson and Lansing. His four most recent citations in June were for battery.
Barkers had been sentenced to prison for aggravated battery and aggravated robbery in 2017. He was ordered to serve 15 years for robbing and beating a priest in Kansas City, Kansas.
THE LAWSUIT brought by Raburn’s family alleged the Department of Corrections and Centurion were negligent for failing to protect the 62-year-old Raburn from Barkers.
At 9:30 p.m. Jan. 6, 2023, Lansing Correctional Facility contacted the KBI to report a suspicious death. Corrections department officials said LCF personnel were summoned to the cell by Barkers. Raburn was found unresponsive.
At the time of Raburn’s death, he was incarcerated for violating the state’s offender registry law. He was convicted in 2005 of aggravated kidnapping in Neosho County and served eight years in prison. He was returned to state custody after failing to meet requirements of the registry.
The State Finance Council voted 9-0 on Tuesday to approve the latest settlement in the case without debate following an executive session closed to the public. The motion to adopt the agreement was made by Hawkins, the House’s top Republican, and seconded by Masterson, the Senate’s GOP president.
