Man Shot By SWAT Team While Holding Woman At Knifepoint Jailed: Cops

WAUKEGAN, IL — The man who was shot by police last week during a hostage standoff in Round Lake was ordered to remain jailed while awaiting trial on charges of aggravated unlawful restraint and domestic violence.

Gerzin Ramirez-Perez, 33, was critically wounded on Sept. 19 when he was shot by two members of a regional SWAT team, who were called to his basement apartment after police spotted him holding with a knife to her throat, authorities said.

Ramirez-Perez was released from Advocate Condell Medical Center in Libertyville on Monday and appeared in court for the first time Wednesday in Waukegan.

According to prosecutors, officers from the Round Lake Police Department were investigating a 911 call where the caller hung up shortly after 6:30 p.m. when they found the captive woman. They called in the Northern Illinois Police Alarm System, or NIPAS, SWAT team which showed up around 8 p.m.

"After this NIPAS team had been on the scene for almost an hour," said Assistant State's Attorney George Pappas. "The NIPAS team made entry at 8:58 p.m. and were forced to shoot [Ramirez-Perez] in order to save the victim."

Arguing that Ramirez-Perez was a flight risk and a danger to others, Pappas said the woman told detectives that she and Ramirez-Perez planned to return to Nicaragua as soon as he was released from the hospital.

Pappas said the woman told investigators that they had come to the United States in November 2022 and they still had a young child in their native country. The prosecutor also said Ramirez-Perez had used three other names while in the United States, with one linked to a September 2021 order or protection.

Ramirez-Perez's defense attorney called as a witness the woman who he is accused of illegally holding at knifepoint. She testified that she was not afraid of Ramirez-Perez, but he needed help and had hallucinating recently.

According to prosecutors, Ramirez-Perez admitted to hospital staff that he was using cocaine when he was shot by police.

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Lake County Associate Judge Theodore Potkonjak found that there was no combination of conditions of release that could assure that Ramirez-Perez was going to show up to court and not be a danger to others. He confirmed that Ramirez-Perez entered the country illegally through Texas in November 2022, when he was released pending deportation proceedings.

"He's facing facing 2-5 years in the Illinois Department of Corrections," Potkonjak said. "So the incentives to leave the jurisdiction should be, at least, there. And obviously, I've heard the evidence as far as a crime of violence involving a lethal weapon."

Ramirez-Perez is due back in court for a preliminary hearing on Oct. 24.

Earlier: Round Lake Man Faces Charges Following Hostage Situation: Police