A Milwaukee County inmate already jailed on domestic violence charges used jail phones and a county-issued tablet to call and message his alleged victim 2,439 times, according to prosecutors.
Damian Luis Cosme-Torres, 27, now faces a new felony count of intimidating a victim and a misdemeanor count of contempt of court. He is accused of calling and messaging the 19-year-old woman for months after a court ordered him to stay away from her.
The case is the latest failure in Milwaukee County’s inmate communications program. County Executive David Crowley, the Democratic nominee for governor, approved the tablet contract in 2022 and signed a three-year extension in 2025.
Officers responded to a domestic violence call on February 27 and found a woman who said Cosme-Torres had strangled her and slammed her head against a wall, according to WISN 12 News and court records. He was charged with strangulation and suffocation, battery, and intimidation of a victim. Bail was set at $3,000 cash. A no-contact order barred him from contacting the victim.
Investigators say the contact started almost immediately. Prosecutors counted 2,439 calls to the woman’s phone over five months. Cosme-Torres also sent threatening messages on a jail-issued tablet and used 81 other inmates’ PIN numbers to reach her, WISN reported. The victim later told police he called her “every [expletive] day” even after she blocked the jail number.
On April 9, the woman recanted her earlier statements to prosecutors. They kept monitoring his communications and say the messages grew more violent. An Aug. 9 tablet message quoted in court records read, in part: “IF I GET OUT I SWEAR TO GET MY REVENGE, A LIFE FOR A LIFE … U WILL PAY FOR TAKING EVERYTHING FROM ME.”
The woman told investigators he threatened to harm her and her family and to publish intimate images of her. Recorded calls and tablet messages also included threats of suicide, according to the complaint.
Records show Cosme-Torres spent most of that time at Milwaukee County’s Community Reintegration Center, overseen by the county executive’s office. Assistant District Attorney Katie Bakunowicz asked a judge on September 18 to revoke his jail communication privileges. A judge signed that order Monday.
The Milwaukee County Sheriff’s Office has said the devices are not consumer iPads and cannot browse the open internet. Those safeguards did not stop this case. Prosecutors said inmate Amier Jones Jr. attempted more than 1,500 contacts with a domestic violence victim this year. In August, Judge David Borowski condemned the policy after a man charged in a triple homicide used a jail device to discuss threatening witnesses.
“Why is the sheriff’s department giving laptops and iPads to defendants that are charged in homicides? Or any defendants?” Borowski asked in court.
Republican gubernatorial nominee Tom Tiffany has argued Crowley approved the program, extended it after the first public failures, and left victims exposed. Crowley’s office has said the tablets help inmates stay connected to family.
Cosme-Torres is due in court Oct. 29 on the new intimidation charge and the original domestic violence case.
