CHICAGO — The man accused of fatally shooting a Chicago Police officer and critically wounding his partner concealed a gun through at least one search before he allegedly fired on the officers while inside Endeavor Swedish Hospital over the weekend, prosecutors said Thursday.

Cook County Judge D’Anthony Thedford ordered 26-year-old Alphanso Talley held pending trial for dozens of charges connected to an alleged armed robbery at an Albany Park Dollar store and the subsequent homicide of Officer John Bartholomew and shooting of Bartholomew’s colleague.

“It is clear that you pose a real and present threat to any person you are around,” Thedford told Talley. “If you are out, you are dangerous.”

Thursday’s hearing was the most detailed account so far of the shooting that killed Bartholomew and left his partner in critical condition. The case, and Talley’s preceding conviction record, has also renewed debates up and down the state about the implementation of the Pretrial Fairness Act, the use of electronic monitoring for defendants on parole or pretrial release and prompted a discussion of whether police protocols were adequately followed to search Talley before he was taken for treatment at Swedish Hospital.

When Talley was first brought out around 11:45 a.m. to Courtroom 102, he made eye contact and smiled at a row of people who got to their feet in the third row of the room. Police brass, aldermen and leaders of the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge #7 lined the back walls of the room. Assistant Public Defender Julie Koehler sat with Talley at the defense table.

Assistant State’s Attorney Mike Pekara began with allegations that Talley and an unknown companion had taken about $110 at gunpoint from an Albany Park Family Dollar store around 8 a.m. Saturday morning, alleging that police searched Talley upon his arrest and recovered a wad of bloody cash.

The store clerk, who sustained a broken nose and two black eyes from being pistol-whipped during the robbery, later identified Talley and her wallet, which police found in a trash can near the store.

While in custody in the back of a squad car, Pekara said Talley was captured on camera fidgeting as though he were hiding something behind his back. He claimed to have swallowed drugs and said his legs were numb.

At Swedish Hospital, Talley allegedly kept his pants on at first while changing into a hospital gown, but later removed them. He had his left arm cuffed to the bed and kept his right arm underneath a blanket that was draped over him. Pekara said hospital surveillance footage captured him fidgeting under the blanket.

Inside the CT room, Pekara said that as Bartholomew uncuffed him from the bed, Talley took the gun from under the blanket and shot Bartholomew in the head.

An MRI technician heard a loud bang and saw both Bartholomew’s shooting and the shooting of Officer Nelson Crespo moments later.

The technician used a staff ID to hide in a nearby room and saw Talley bend over Crespo before he reentered the CT room. Hospital surveillance footage captured Talley point the gun at the room where the technician was hiding, Pekara said, before starting to make his way out of the building.

Patients were trying to hide in the hospital hallways as Talley went through a set of double doors, Pekara said. The shooting triggered a fire alarm and two engineers, going to investigate the alarm, encountered Talley inside the hospital.

Pekara said Talley pointed the gun at the engineers and ripped one of their IDs off. He then shot out a glass door, Pekara continued, chased the person on the other side of the door and demanded that he give him his keys, then chased a postal worker nearby the hospital as he was making his escape.

Police arrested Talley from underneath a porch about a third of a mile from the hospital, on the 2600 block of West Carmen Avenue. Pekara said at the time of his arrest, Talley was trying to call an Uber from an account belonging to another witness.

Talley at one or two points engaged the sheriff’s deputies who stood over him throughout the hearing and at one point started laughing as Pekara argued for his detention.

“This is not your show, sir,” a visibly aggravated Thedford said. “Please cut the giggling out for me, so we can finish.”

“It would be absurd to think he could be trusted,” Pekara said, walking through Talley’s preceding criminal history and violations of past release terms. “We know that because he has violated every condition of relief time and time and time again.”

Koehler used some of her argument to address the swirling controversy over Judge John F. Lyke’s decision to release Talley on electronic monitoring in December.

Shortly afterward, Talley apparently tried to pipe up again, prompting Thedford to tell Koehler that this was Talley’s “last warning.”

“I will conduct this hearing in the lockup,” he said.

“Mr. Talley is not a person we should throw away,” she said. “He has the ability to be rehabilitated.”

Koehler also told Thedford that Talley had been hospitalized multiple times for suicide attempts, beginning at age 9, and was diagnosed with depression and anxiety. He was a ward of the Department of Children and Family Services until he was 18, she continued, and while in custody had taken numerous courses in anger management, electronics and other topics.

“We are asking he be given an opportunity to be treated for the mental health problems that he has,” Koehler said.

Thedford didn’t doubt that Talley made efforts at self-improvement while behind bars, but noted that one of his previous cases involved a charge of Talley throwing feces at a correctional officer while in custody.

“Somehow you are able to maintain that same gun at the hospital that was used in the armed robbery,” Thedford said. “You shot that CPD officer point blank in the face.”

Ultimately, he ordered Talley held in custody and set his next court date for May 20.

As Talley left the courtroom, the family that stood to greet him got up and got up with calls of “I love you.” One woman, who identified herself as his stepsister, briefly told reporters in the courthouse lobby that she believed in his innocence before Koehler, walking past, escorted her away from the microphones.

Fraternal Order of Police Lodge #7 President John Catanzara spoke shortly afterward. He called Talley “a piece of (expletive) and said he was “the reason the death penalty should exist in Illinois.”

The injured officer, he added, was making “minimal progress.”

“His eyes are open,” Catanzara said. “He is able to respond to questions through blinking. It’s just kind of a wait and see.”

Catanzara, the aldermen and other advocates repeated their criticisms of the Pretrial Fairness Act and Lyke, arguing that had cash bail still been in place in Illinois or had Lyke made a different decision on Talley’s custody, Bartholomew’s life would have been saved.

But Catanzara, asked whether Bartholomew’s death could it had actually be attributed to a failure in police search procedure, said he didn’t think an answer would ever come out.

“Nobody knows what happened with that gun,” he said. “Nobody knows if it was tucked inside a fat roll or if it was tucked inside his body. And I don’t know that we’ll ever have an answer, because he’s certainly not a believable character.”

Republicans continued to blame Illinois’ SAFE-T Act for Talley being on the streets before Saturday’s shootings.

In Springfield, the GOP nominee for governor, Darren Bailey, reiterated his call to reform or repeal the SAFE-T Act, a stance he’s held since his last run for governor in 2022.

“That’s not just tragic. That is (a) complete failure of leadership. And the people of Illinois, they deserve answers,” Bailey said during a press conference Thursday.

Bailey also proposed ways to reform the pretrial criminal justice system in Illinois, but many of his initiatives were light on specifics or were reforms that are already in place.

Earlier this week, House GOP Leader Tony McCombie and Senate GOP Leader Curran called for changes to the SAFE-T Act, including a requirement that people on pretrial release for a felony who are then arrested for another felony be detained.

Bailey’s proposals would require judges to provide written justifications for release decisions and allow detention of individuals who pose a public safety risk — something the SAFE-T Act already permits.

No lawmaker has introduced his proposal yet, but Bailey listed several Republican legislators whom he hoped would carry the legislation. Republican measures have little chance of passing in the General Assembly, which is run by a supermajority of Democrats. No initiatives would be voted on in this session, as the General Assembly is scheduled to adjourn at the end of May.

Matthew McLoughlin, campaign coordinator for Illinois Network for Pretrial Justice, which supported the SAFE-T Act, said Chicago Police officer John Bartholomew’s death is a tragedy, but said Bailey’s plans would trample on due process rights.

“It’s unfortunate that Republicans like Darren Bailey are taking people’s pain and suffering and immediately rushing in front of cameras to call for taking away thousands of people’s pretrial rights,” McLoughlin said.

Around 94% of people released pretrial in Cook County have not been charged with new offenses against a person, according to INPJ.

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