Friday, May 26, 2017

Trumpet the good news, mutter the bad




     Listen to Pat Gengler, spokesman for the Kane County Sheriff's Office, telling CNN on May 13 how a SWAT team took down Tywon Salters after he grabbed a correctional officer's gun and took a pair of nurses hostage at Delnor Hospital in Geneva, and you'd think the operation was a textbook example of police efficiency.
     "The officer was able to get away," Gengler said of what happened after Salters took a 9 mm handgun away from Officer Shawn Loomis. "The SWAT team made a decision to make entry into the room. One of the SWAT team operators did discharge his firearm, striking the inmate and killing him."
     Nothing about Loomis possibly hiding in a hospital room after losing his weapon.
     Nothing about Loomis perhaps failing to alert anybody that there was an armed felon on the loose.
     And absolutely nothing about a nurse hostage being shot by the SWAT team — or possibly being raped during the three hours law enforcement was trying to figure out what to do.
     To learn that, you have to read a lawsuit filed against the Kane County Sheriff's Office, Loomis, in particular, and Apex3 Security, the company that's supposed to provide security in the hospital.
     That lawsuit, filed Thursday, makes alarming reading.

     To continue reading, click here.

14 comments:

  1. dude! very odd subject matter for a story of yours . what gives?

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    1. Well done. It's hard to see how the police could have been more inept, before and after the fact.

      john

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    2. I'm not sure I would agree with that. Routine becomes oppressive, shackling and unshackling some prisoners at a hospital, and no one knows how they'd react if someone grabbed their gun. My central criticism is, having screwed up, they kept silent about it. We all make mistakes.

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    3. Having been the recipient over the years of more information than I desired from a long-time Cook County corrections officer, I can attest that it is common knowledge among security people that hospital time is quintessentially dangerous. Plus this prisoner had already demonstrated a propensity for hurting himself and others -- he should have been watched carefully and restrained appropriately every second of every day that he was in the hospital. That said, I understand the reticence better than the negligence.


      john

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    4. Certainly an instance of silence not being golden. Who is the physically impaired nymphet, may we ask?

      Tom

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    5. A sculpture by Damien Hirst, at the Palazzo Grassi in Venice. I must admit I was flustered at what to use to illustrate this column. It seemed at least vaguely relevant.

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    6. i find this sculpture disturbing and demonstrative of many aspects of your piece. the brokenness of our law enforcement institutions, the agony of the assault victim , even the derangement of the perpetrator, he'd eaten a sandal? it seems very relevant and well selected. but a nymphet? seriously?

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    7. In Tom's defense, I think he was being merely ornate. She's too old for a nymphet, for starters.

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    8. and we have no business describing any female with that adjective even a representation of a female . toms a big boy no need to defend him . maybe he'd like to come along with the rest of us into the 21st century

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  3. But that's a big mistake and someone may have been raped because of that error.

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  4. I should probably let this pass, but in case anybody is still reading, I ptobably wouldn't call a sexually attractive young woman -- my Merriam Webster's definition of nymphet -- that to her face, but I'm not convinced it isn't an apt description for Damien Hurst's statue. She's not Lolita, who was only 12, but "young woman" sems to fit. For the record, I entered the 21st Century right along with FME and everybody else, but perhaps failed to get the updated index of forbidden words.

    TE

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    1. mr. Evans, firstly mr. Steinbergs piece, spoke of a woman who possibly had been raped. and shot. pretty serious subject matter from my perspective. my reply to your comment was egads, a term rarely used except by old folks such as ourselves, if them. as I'm sure you know its an expression of surprise not admonishment . my second reply was to Neil who moderates this forum and was not meant to be a personal attack i apologize if it came off that way. many young women find words such as honey, sweet , babe and darling to be inappropriate and demeaning. especially coming from older men like us. i love words and you can use whichever ones you want but saying something on the inter webs is pretty much like saying it to everybody's face. again my regrets for personalizing this but i would hope nobody would refer to my 16 year old niece or any young woman as a nymphet. i think it has a very definite sexual connotation often negative. but i guess I'm just being anal

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