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ST. LOUIS — The city sheriff has refused to transport city jail detainees to and from hospitals for medical care, just a week after telling aldermen he would continue the service, city officials said.

A spokesperson for the city’s Department of Public Safety said Sheriff Alfred Montgomery’s office had started refusing requests on June 3, the day after the hearing with aldermen. Jail guards, already in short supply, have had to take inmates instead.

“As of today, he has refused six,� the spokesperson, Jamella Brown, said late Monday.

The sheriff’s office denied the allegation.

“They’re lying,� said Blake Lawrence, an attorney for the sheriff. “We’re doing everything as before.�

He said there have been times when there were no deputies available to take inmates to the hospital. Sometimes they’re already with an inmate.

David Mason, another attorney for the sheriff, added in a statement that the duty to ensure detainees receive medical care falls on the city’s public safety department, which oversees most other functions at the City Justice Center.

The back-and-forth reprised concerns about Montgomery’s office at a time when officials across the city are growing increasingly skeptical of the newly elected sheriff.

They have already taken issue with his spending, which has fueled a budget deficit in his office. ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ were angry when, late last month, Montgomery threatened to stop taking detainees to the hospital unless the city increased his budget.

But they thought they had settled at least that issue last week when Montgomery rescinded the threat in a public budget hearing.

ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ were not happy to hear things had changed.

“I would hope that’s not true,� said Alderman Rasheen Aldridge, who chairs the budget committee. “We’re talking about people’s lives here.�

“If he’s not transporting prisoners,� said Alderman Michael Browning, of Forest Park Southeast, “that’s a direct dereliction of his duty.�

Montgomery, 28, has been dogged by controversy almost since the moment he took office in January. He has been investigated for ordering the handcuffing of a top jail official, sued after telling a deputy to roll golden dice in order to keep his job and criticized for having a deputy .

He has also been grilled about the firing of more than a dozen senior officials, whose benefit payouts have fueled a budget deficit on track to hit $600,000 by the end of the year.

A watchdog group has called for his ouster.

But his threat last month to stop having deputies transport jail detainees to hospitals, a decades-old agreement by his predecessors, provoked one of the strongest reactions at City Hall.

Mayor Cara Spencer said he was abdicating his responsibility. Aldermen hauled him in for a hearing last Monday to chastise him for putting health care service at the jail at risk after years of problems and deaths.

Montgomery started that hearing by rescinding his threat on the condition that aldermen try to help him out. They said they would talk. Montgomery then said his threat was null and void.

“It does not exist anymore,� he said.

But the next day, the jail asked for a transport, and Montgomery said no, said Brown, the city spokesperson.

Montgomery declined two more requests on Thursday, another on Friday, another on Saturday, and again on Monday, Brown said. Each time, city corrections staff handled the transport.

Brown said that’s not unheard of: Corrections staff have taken inmates to the hospital before when the sheriff’s department is understaffed.

“But that’s more sporadic than what’s happening now,� she said. “This is not the norm.�

The sheriff, she said, needs to fulfill his duty. Jail guards are needed at the jail, where severe understaffing is a well-known issue.

But Lawrence, one of the sheriff’s lawyers, said his department doesn’t have enough people, either, and needs a bigger budget.

He suggested looking at the jail’s allocation. There are dozens of vacant positions there, he said.

Still, he said, the sheriff’s office is doing its job.

“We’ve got two of our deputies over there at the hospital right now,� he said.