A Hyde Park man injured seven police officers who were called to a downtown storage facility because he refused to leave the premises, according to Chicago police.
Officers responded to Safeguard Self Storage, 1353 South Wabash, shortly after 11 a.m. to handle a routine trespassing call. A facility manager told arriving officers that 57-year-old Nathan Arrington refused to leave the property and threatened to hurt the manager because he was not happy with a company policy, the police department said.
Officers worked for nearly 45 minutes to resolve the situation and convinced the company to allow Arrington to change his clothes inside a storage bin as he requested, according to police records and allegations made in bond court Sunday.
After Arrington changed his clothes, he asked if he could change them again, but officers declined that request and asked him to leave, prosecutors said. He allegedly went back inside the bin and tried to close the door, striking an officer.
With police handcuffs attached to one of his wrists, Arrington then pushed both officers around the storage bin as they tried to arrest him, an assistant state’s attorney said. A Tazer charge had no effect on Arrington and police only gained control of him after additional officers responded to an officer in distress call, according to allegations.
Six officers were treated at the scene for minor injuries while one officer went to Northwestern Memorial Hospital in fair condition with a separated shoulder and a knee injury, police said.
Prosecutors charged Arrington with two felony counts of aggravated battery of a police officer, felony resisting police, misdemeanor assault, and trespassing. Judge Susana Ortiz set bail at $5,000. Arrington will need to post a $500 deposit bond and go onto electronic monitoring to get out of jail before trial.
Arrington has ten felony theft convictions and eight misdemeanor theft convictions in his past, according to prosecutors.
