PITTSBURGH — A former inmate at the Allegheny County Jail claims in a federal lawsuit that two guards handcuffed him so tightly it broke the skin, leading to medical complications and eventually his hand being amputated.

Online court records show the inmate, James Cotton, 60, of Monroeville, is now serving three to six years in a state prison for failing to register as a sex offender and other crimes.

In 2008, he was an inmate at the Allegheny County Jail, according to the handwritten federal lawsuit he filed without an attorney on Thursday.

Cotton’s lawsuit is short on details. He claims two guards whose names he doesn’t know tightened the cuffs, “which caused the loss of hand ... due to serious medical issues” that he claims the jail and Allegheny Correctional Health Services failed to diagnose. The lawsuit doesn’t specify when that happened, except to say it occurred in the year leading up to the amputation. The suit doesn’t say which hand was amputated.

Cotton is seeking $5 million for “mental and emotional injury damages (and) actual damages” claiming his hand was removed “due to the inadequate medical care, excessive force, (and) physical injury.”