Jimmy Causey is currently serving a life sentence for the armed robbery and kidnapping of a prominent defense attorney in Columbia, S.C. (Image courtesy of Williamson County Texas Jail).
An inmate likely used wire cutters and a cellphone delivered via drone to bust out of a maximum security prison in South Carolina last week, Reuters reported.
Inmate Jimmy Causey, 48, managed to escape the Lieber Correctional Institution in Ridgeville on the Fourth of July before being captured in Texas on Friday, July 7, with multiple guns and over $47,000 in cash, according to authorities.
S.C. Department of Corrections Director Bryan Stirling explained that Causey appeared to have planned his escape using the smuggled cellphone, after which he utilized the wire cutters to cut his way through prison fences. Officials said Causey, who is currently serving a life sentence for the armed robbery and kidnapping of prominent Columbia defense lawyer Jack Swerling, also made sure to leave a makeshift dummy in his bunk to throw off prison guards.
“We believe that a drone was used to fly in the tools that allowed him to escape,” Stirling told reporters at a news conference. “As long as [inmates] have access to cellphones, this is just going to keep on happening and happening and happening.”
Texas Rangers captured Causey at a motel in Austin early Friday, where they discovered a handgun, a shotgun, ammunition, four cellphones and more than $47,000, according to state law enforcement division Chief Mark Keel.
This isn’t the first time Causey has managed to break out of prison, however. The Post and Courier reported that in 2005, he and a fellow inmate escaped the Broad River Correctional Institution in Columbia by hiding in a trash dumpster transported off the prison grounds. In that instance, the pair used toilet paper heads crafted by other prisoners and placed them in their beds to deceive guards. They were eventually captured after a three-day manhunt, according to the newspaper.
With the popularity of drones on the rise, authorities said that contraband deliveries to prisons via the unmanned aircraft have become increasingly common.
In 2015, a drone dropped illegal drugs and tobacco products into an Ohio prison’s exercise yard, causing a fight to break out, Reuters reported. The next year, an inmate in Maryland was convicted of trying to sneak drugs into a prison using one of the airborne devices.
“It is senseless to me that the federal government continues to prohibit state agencies and state corrections officials from blocking cellphones,” said Keel, who, along with other prison officials, have called on the federal government to give corrections facilities the authority to block cellphone signals.
“Unfortunately, as long as cellphones continue to be utilized by inmates in prisons, we’re going to have things like this. We’re going to have very well-planned escapes, as this was, [that] are going to be able to continue,” he added.
Local station WLTX reported that a the prison guard tasked with keeping an eye on Causey was fired following the inmate’s recent escape.
