A ‘perfect storm’ of circumstances resulted in a visitor somehow getting trapped inside the maximum security wing of the Cook County, Illinois Jail for more than 30 hours.
The man arrived to visit his son at the jail at about 6 p.m. Saturday, July 5, 2014. The man was reportedly unfamiliar with the Division 9 area of the jail, where his son had recently been moved, according to our sister station WGN-TV.
Contractors, working on a surveillance camera there, had apparently left a visitor’s room door propped open according to Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart.
When the door closed behind him, no one could see him because the cameras were down; and no one could hear the man in the room that is seldom occupied by visitors, Dart said. Somehow, another visitor’s pass was counted twice, so corrections workers thought all visitors had been counted as they departed.
The man spent more than 30 hours trapped in the room, before he used his hand to break off a sprinkler head which alerted jail staff to check the room.
The man was freed at about 1 a.m. Monday, July 7.
