US Citizen Quarantined For Life

A young man sits in a locked room, windows covered, in the detention ward at Maricopa Medical Center, under sheriff's guard.

He is not allowed a TV, a radio, a cellphone, a shower or visitors. A video camera catches his every move.

His floormates are criminals, including a suspect in the killing of a police officer.

He has been isolated here for eight months and is expected to remain much longer, perhaps until he dies.

But Robert Daniels is not charged with any crime. He has tuberculosis. And he is under court-ordered confinement because he violated the rules of voluntary quarantine, exposing others to a potentially deadly illness.

Daniels is afflicted with a TB strain so dangerous that he has never met his appointed lawyer, Robert Blecher, who describes the situation as "extremely unusual."

The disease is spread by airborne contact: If a patient coughs in public, others are endangered. READ MORE>