New Orleans, LA – Authorities have announced the recapture of a fifth inmate who escaped from the Orleans Justice Center last week. The announcement coincided with the arrest of a maintenance worker at the facility who is accused of aiding in the elaborate breakout.
Corey Boyd, 19, was apprehended on Tuesday, several days after he and nine other men escaped the New Orleans jail on Friday. The mass escape has triggered a state of high alert in the city, with concerns extending to the district attorney’s office staff, and prompted investigations by local and state officials into the security failures that allowed the incident to occur. All five recaptured inmates were located within New Orleans.
Earlier on Tuesday, Sterling Williams, a maintenance worker employed by the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office, was arrested and charged with one count of malfeasance in office and 10 counts of principal to simple escape. An arrest warrant affidavit detailed that Williams allegedly “willfully and maliciously” assisted with the escape. Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill announced via social media that Williams’ bond was set at $1.1 million, with $100,000 allocated to each of the charges. Public defender Michael Kennedy has been appointed to represent Williams and is scheduled to meet with him on Wednesday morning.
Murrill indicated to Fox News on Tuesday that authorities believe Williams’ involvement spanned a period of time, stating, “We think that it was more than just that night. I can’t really give all the details of times and dates, but we believe this person had multiple days of involvement.”
According to the affidavit, an agent with the Louisiana Bureau of Investigation described Williams as initially being “evasive and untruthful” before eventually providing information. The affidavit further stated that Williams claimed inmate Antoine Massey threatened to harm him if he did not turn off the water supply to the cell used in the escape. Investigators believe that disabling the water supply was crucial to the escape plan, preventing potential flooding that could have alerted authorities.
Notably, Antoine Massey has a prior history of escape, having broken out of a detention center in North Louisiana in August 2019. Morehouse Parish Sheriff’s Office Chief James Mardis told CNN that Massey’s second escape was not surprising given his past record. In the 2019 incident, Massey and another inmate cut through a fence at the Morehouse Parish Detention Center and escaped before being recaptured in Texas.
The recent escape from the Orleans Justice Center involved Massey and nine other inmates who created a hole behind a metal toilet in their cell shortly after midnight on Friday. The escapees face a range of serious charges, including aggravated assault with a firearm, false imprisonment with a weapon, and murder.
Orleans Parish Sheriff Susan Hutson acknowledged on Tuesday during a city council committee meeting that the escape was a “coordinated effort, aided by individuals inside our own agency, who made the choice to break the law.” She emphasized that the agency is committed to “pursuing everyone involved.”
Following the escape, the sheriff’s office provided city council members with notes outlining security failures, including instances where “staff failed to conduct proper security checks, security checks were skipped or incomplete,” and a failure to detect early warning signs. Hutson further stated that the jail continues to operate with “outdated surveillance, aging infrastructure, blind spots in supervision and critical staffing shortages,” issues that have been repeatedly raised in funding requests.
In response to the security breach, the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections is deploying at least 10 experienced auditors to the Orleans Justice Center this week to conduct a comprehensive investigation. The audit will focus on jail operations, including overall security, staffing levels, and existing policies and procedures. Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry tasked the department with this audit to ensure the Orleans Parish Sheriff’s Office is compliant with the necessary conditions for the safe and legal operation of a jail facility. The last audit of the facility by the Department occurred in 2014.
Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections Secretary Gary Westcott emphasized the importance of public trust and safety, stating that events like the recent jailbreak erode that confidence. He affirmed the department’s commitment to providing insights that will help local jails prevent future occurrences.
The timeline of the escape revealed that the Orleans Justice Center went into lockdown at 10:30 p.m. on Thursday. Shortly after midnight on Friday, a corrections monitoring technician briefly left their post for food. During this time, several inmates began forcefully manipulating the door of Cell Delta 1006. Orleans Parish District Attorney Jason Williams noted during a Monday news conference that a staff member should have been continuously monitoring security cameras. The cell door eventually broke open, and the inmates moved into an adjacent cell. Within minutes, ten inmates navigated past a metal toilet, squeezed through a small hole carved in the wall, and fled the facility. They reportedly used blankets to protect themselves from barbed wire as they scaled a fence, crossed Interstate 10, and disappeared into a nearby neighborhood after discarding their inmate clothing. A message left behind, “To Easy LoL,” underscored the brazen nature of the escape. The hole used in the escape highlighted significant security lapses, with the district attorney questioning how the destruction of the toilet and wall went unnoticed over an extended period. The escape was not discovered until a routine head count at 8:30 a.m. on Friday.
Five of the ten escapees – Corey Boyd, Dkenan Dennis, Robert Moody, Kendell Myles, and Gary Price – have been apprehended and are currently being held at the Louisiana State Penitentiary, a maximum-security facility. Antoine Massey, along with Jermaine Donald, Derrick Groves, Leo Tate, and Lenton Vanburen, remain at large.
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