Tyrel Benedict's mother fighting shorter hospital visits

A Halifax mother is fighting to see her son in hospital after he suffered a severe brain injury from a beating at the Burnside jail.

For two weeks, Sherry Benedict didn't know if her son, lying in a coma, would live.

Benedict says on March 10, Tyrel Benedict was serving his first night at the Burnside jail on charges of breaking and entering when he was beaten inside his cell.

"And every time the doctors told me he still wasn't out the woods a piece of me died," she said.

Up until Monday, Benedict had been by his bedside constantly. She has been told her visits to the QE II hospital were being shortened to an hour a day.

Her son is no longer in critical condition but is still considered an inmate.

"It's ridiculous," she said. "Yes, he is in your custody. He is also a patient in the hospital suffering from a severe brain trauma. He needs his family, he's not just a prisoner."

Benedict says the 19-year-old still requires her calming influence at his bedside so he can continue his long road to recovery.

"I'm scared he's going to get very agitated," she said. "He's going to be asking for me, he's going to be asking for his girlfriend, his sister, which he does every day on a daily basis, and we are not going to be able to be there for him, and he is going to feel abandoned. He's going to end up taking a turn for the worse."

Benedict is asking correctional services to look at the situation and have some compassion. She says her son should have the same rights as any other hospital patient.

"Because he's still in correctional services - custody - I am not allowed to be there," she said. "I have no idea why this is continuing on so long. I don't know why the guards are still in the room and I don't understand why he's not been released on bail. What do they expect he's going to do? He's in the hospital and he needs to recover."

According to Benedict, her son came very close to dying after the assault. She asks where was help then.

"I think it's ridiculous. You weren't able to protect my son when he was in jail," she said. "Where were you when this was happening to my son? When my son was getting beat, his face was unrecognizable. Where were they then?"

Benedict says her son suffers from memory loss, confusion and frustration. He has also been physically weakened after five weeks in a hospital bed.

"He's not capable of understanding what's going on. He doesn't remember being in jail. He doesn't remember doing a break and enter," she said. "He doesn't remember any of this."

"His brain is not the same, his head is not the same. He's not the same as he was before all of this happened."

A spokesperson for the Department of Justice says they are following jail policy. Minister Lena Diab says there now has to be a time limit placed on the visits.

"There has to be, I mean for security reasons. There has to be a time frame for them," she said.

Benedict is looking to hire a lawyer to see if her son can be released on bail, even as he lies in a hospital bed, so she is free to see him during regular visiting hours.