David P. Sopys’ family grew worried after he missed their Fourth of July barbecue.
Sopys, 46, lived on and off at various facilities while living with a learning disability, but he always came home for the holidays, said Chamille Sopys, his niece.
“He always comes over for any holiday, especially when food’s involved,” Chamille Sopys said. “It was just kind of weird that he hadn’t called or said anything. [My mother] doesn’t go that many days without talking to him at all.”
A few days later, the family learned Sopys died July 1, days before the holiday. On Monday, autopsy results showed Sopys died from heat exposure combined with cocaine and two prescription medications, fluoxetine and aripiprazole. His niece says they believe fentanyl also contributed to his death.
It was the seventh heat-related death so far this year in Cook County. That marks the most people who have died from heat-related causes in a single year in more than a decade, according to a WBEZ analysis of data from the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
Sopys had been outside with a group of people around 6:30 p.m. on July 1, in the 6300 block of South Campbell Avenue in the Chicago Lawn neighborhood when he became unresponsive, according to Chicago police. He was taken to Little Company of Mary Hospital where he was later pronounced dead.
Chicago police said Monday that the investigation into his death remained pending.
His death means the heat this summer has caused more deaths than in 2022 and 2019 when the county logged six heat-related deaths in each of those years, according to the WBEZ analysis. This month is the deadliest month for heat-related causes since at least 2015, the most recent year for which data is readily available.
But other past heat waves have been attributed to more deaths.
Chicago’s deadliest heat wave happened in 1995 when more than 700 people died. Chicago also suffered deadly heat waves in 1999, when 10 people died, and in 2012, when 22 people died.
Sopys is the fourth person in their 40s who died from heat-related causes this year. The other people whose deaths this year have been attributed to the heat are: Stephanie Rodriguez, 45; David Gonzalez, 44; Barbara Whigham, 71; Mike Rodriguez, 57; Daniel Machnikowski, 69; and Victor Ferguson, 48. One of the deaths occurred in north suburban Evanston. All of the other six deaths occurred in Chicago neighborhoods on the city’s South, Southwest or West sides.
On the day Sopys died, the temperature at O’Hare Airport reached 95 degrees, according to the National Weather Service. The Chicago area had been placed under an extreme heat warning when he died. Six of the deaths happened during the first four days of July. That’s the most heat-related deaths in a four-day span since at least 2015.
Chamille Sopys said her mother had last talked to her uncle the morning of July 1. The family knew he had recently gotten out of a facility, but he hadn’t shared with them where exactly he was living.
He at one point lived independently and other times with family. Chamille Sopys said more can be done to protect people who are outside during extreme weather.
“The facilities that used to be open when I was growing up no longer exist for certain people, and I feel like that is a horrible situation especially for a lot of the people who are homeless and it’s not their complete fault that they’re homeless,” said Chamille Sopys. “They might have learning disabilities or something of that nature to the point where they cannot get jobs and they fall into that stigmatism. Like my uncle, he was one of those people.”
The family released balloons in his memory this past weekend. Chamille Sopys, who lived with her uncle and grandmother at one point, will remember how her uncle helped her with math homework as a child and for his sense of humor.
“He was a very family-oriented person,” she said. “When it came to his friends, he would do anything for his friends to the point where we always felt like people took advantage of him.”
The news of Sopys’ death comes as the area was under another extreme heat warning, with the heat index expected to reach 110 to 115 degrees, according to the National Weather Service. Residents in Chicago can call 3-1-1 to request well-being checks for neighbors or loved ones during the heat.