In April of 2019, Joseph McCormick was arrested on a warrant filed by the Loves Park Police Department.
Joseph was taken to the Winnebago County Jail where he spent the next seven months.
On November 30th, 2019, it was reported that in a phone call to his father, McCormick was not suicidal or depressed and said something along the lines of “I’ll talk to you tomorrow dad”
The next day however, Joseph was found hanging in his cell. An autopsy done by the recently charged Winnebago County Coroner Bill Hintz ruled to be asphyxia due to hanging.
The family of Joseph called the Winnebago County Jail a place to die.
This was the twentieth case investigated and justified by the Winnebago Boone County Integrity Task Force and 22nd deadly force incident in the 2010’s.
Joseph was at least one of two deaths inside the Winnebago County Jail in 2019 that was investigated by the Winnebago Boone County Integrity Task Force.
It was the ninth deadly force incident since Tom McNamara took mayoral office.