Two nurses who were held hostage earlier this month at Geneva, Ill.-based Northwestern Medicine Delnor Hospital by a Kane County Jail inmate have filed a lawsuit against the county, a corrections deputy and the security firm used by the hospital, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.
While at Delnor Hospital for surgery May 13, inmate Tywon Salters wrestled a handgun from Shawn Loomis, a correctional officer with the Kane County Sherriff's Department. After his gun was taken, the officer ran down the hallway into another room and made no effort to help, Sean Murray, a lawyer representing the two nurses, told reporters this week.
Armed and naked, Mr. Salters took a nurse hostage in an office. He held her at gunpoint, threatened her, forced her to remove her clothes, and verbally and physically abused her, according to the lawsuit. Mr. Salters released the first nurse when a second nurse walked into the room. The lawsuit alleges Mr. Salters took the second nurse into a "decontamination room" on the hospital's first floor where he tortured and raped her during the more than three hours he held her hostage.
"He held a gun to her head the entire time," Mr. Murray told the Chicago Sun-Times. "She was told she was going to die. She was going to leave in a body bag."
SWAT officers fatally shot Mr. Salters about five hours after the ordeal began. Mr. Murray told reporters the nurse was struck in the arm by the bullet that hit Mr. Salters.
The nurses' lawsuit alleges sheriff's officers and private security guards failed to follow proper procedures while guarding Mr. Salters during his hospital stay. The lawsuit alleges the guards used laptops, watched TV and fell asleep on the job. The lawsuit further alleges the guards left Mr. Salters unshackled and unsupervised when the inmate used the bathroom, according to the report.
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