3 prisoners break out of Warren jail

Published 12:00 am Friday, August 23, 2002

[08/23/02]In a feat showing great flexibility, three men escaped from the Warren County Jail early today through a 12-by-18-inch hole.

Johnnie E. Thomas, 17, Leon Walker Bryant, 25, and Leroy “Chuckie” Guise, 20, left their cell block through a gap that had been blocked by a modular toilet unit, Warren County Sheriff Martin Pace said.

“Anybody who knows these individuals is encouraged to call 911 and report their whereabouts,” Pace said.

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Once outside the cell block, they eased into a walk space between the cell block and exterior of the jail, Pace said.

Then, bricks at the sill of a window leading outside were chipped or broken out, apparently with a metal drain cover about the size of a dinner plate, the sheriff said.

Five others remained in the cell block that was added to the original part of the jail, 1000 Grove St., built in 1906. They’ve been moved, Pace said.

The inmates were discovered missing during a midshift head count by jail staff after midnight, Pace said.

A team that included jail and investigative personnel from the Sheriff’s Department and officers of the Vicksburg Police Department, who originally arrested the three men, began searching for them before dawn today, Pace said.

Thomas, 5-foot-6 and 145 pounds, is charged with business burglary and receiving stolen property; Bryant, 5-foot-11 and 160 pounds, is charged with sale of cocaine; and Guise, 5-foot-9 and 180 pounds, is charged with armed robbery and possessing a firearm as a convicted felon.

The inmates were wearing orange jail jumpsuits when they left, Pace said.

Escapes from the jail complex, most of which was built 25 years ago, are rare and when they have occurred have been short-lived bursts through an open door.

The jail is at or near its 145-person capacity, but Pace said he did not think that fact was related to the escape. “This was a regular cell block,” he said. “It was not any kind of overflow area.”

Engineers, a contractor, the county building manager and a bricklayer had been called in to investigate how the prisoners were able to escape, Pace said.