Chicago Jailers Publicly Call Detainee Death a Medical Emergency, Privately Admit Guard Brutality
After Corey Ulmer, 41, died at Chicago’s Cook County Jail on June 21, 2024, deputies of Sheriff Tom Dart informed the detainee’s survivors that “he went to the hospital, and unfortunately he didn’t make it,” recalled Robert Robinson, the dead man’s stepfather. Three days later a Sheriff’s Department spokesman reiterated that Ulmer died of a “medical emergency.”
But just two days after that, on June 26, 2024, an internal report by the sergeant in charge at the time documented a violent confrontation, during which Ulmer became “combative” and tried to “head butt” him; after that, guards beat Ulmer and body-slammed him before a nurse injected him with sedatives. Ulmer, who was bipolar, was sedated with his hands cuffed in front of him, according to the report by Sgt. Enrique Reyes, before the nurse was “unable to get vitals” from the detainee. Yet the following day, on June 27, 2024, Sheriff’s Dart’s spokesman still insisted that “Mr. Ulmer died after suffering a medical emergency.”
Ulmer was incarcerated for violating the terms of his release on electronic monitoring to await trial for brandishing a pocketknife at a bus stop during a bipolar episode in January 2023. His attorney in that case, Jonathan S. Goldman, recalled that Ulmer “was a nice guy in a tight spot, and I felt for him.” Jesse Guth, another attorney and former county prosecutor hired by Ulmer’s family members after his death, said they were “shocked and outraged.”
Robinson recalled that his stepson “was fine when I talked to him” two days before he died. “He wasn’t delusional or anything. I don’t know what happened.” Meanwhile, 11 staffers have been reassigned at the jail. Results of an autopsy were still pending in early August 2024.