The three inmates did not know each other before being housed in the Orange County jail.
Advertisement
Nayeri and Tieu were returned from San Francisco to Santa Ana about 1 a.m. Sunday, according to Orange County sheriff’s Capt. Jeff Hallock. MORE: Who is teacher arrested on suspicion of helping 3 escaped inmates?
Three inmates captured are seen on a video monitor at Orange County Sheriff’s news conference in Santa Ana, Calif., Monday, Feb. 1, 2016. It wasn’t until about 9 p.m. that day that guards realized Hossein Nayeri, 37, Bac Duong, 43, and Jonathan Tieu, 20, were gone.
It started when they rappelled off the roof of the jail and ended more than a week later when one of the fugitives turned himself in and police found the other two hiding out in the parking lot of a San Francisco Whole Foods.
Prosecutors say a man has been arrested on suspicion of providing support in the escape of three inmates from a California jail.
Authorities told KTLA that the inmates kidnapped a taxi driver and forced him to drive them to San Jose.
Details of the escapees eight-day run from a police manhunt were among the announcements of a pair of press conferences by the Orange County Sheriff’s Department and the District Attorney’s office on Monday.
Nayeri was awaiting trial on charges that he kidnapped and tortured a marijuana dispensary owner – cutting off the man’s penis in a bid to learn where he had hidden money.
Nayeri had been in custody since September 2014, Tieu since October 2013 and Duong since December. Her arraignment will be postponed for two weeks while the Sheriff’s Department continues to investigate if she had involvement in the escape. “To defeat these security systems, to defeat these metal grates, to defeat these 1-inch bars, it took some time”.
The fugitives and cabdriver spent a night at an unknown location in Los Angeles County before driving to San Jose where they spent three nights at the Alameda Motel, Hallock said. There, at a motel room, Nayeri and Duong had a physical fight over whether to “kill the taxi cab driver and dump the body”, Hallock said.
On Jan. 23, sheriff’s officials began asking the public for help tracking down the inmates, who had taken up refuge for at the Flamingo Inn in Rosemead.
The next day, the driver took Duong to Santa Ana, where the escapee surrendered.
The Sheriff’s Department had initially said Ravaghi and Nayeri, who was in her class, had exchanged letters of a personal nature.
A woman who taught English at the jail, and is accused of giving Nayeri a paper copy of a Google Earth map that showed an aerial view of the entire jail compound, is also in custody. Yet Rackauckas said Monday that Nayeri wrote the letters himself and Ravaghi is cooperating with investigators.
Had inmates requested any information from Ravaghi, she would been required to notify jail staff in accordance with jail policy, Hallock said. Bac Duong appears on a television monitor during his video rearraignment at the Central Men’s Jail in Santa Ana, Calif. Monday, Feb. 1, 2016, by way of a closed circuit television feed at the jail. The…
Hallock said Thursday that around 10 people had been arrested since the escape January 22.
Tuesday, Jan. 26: Prosecutors charge Loc Ba Nguyen with felony counts, including sending a useful aid to escape from a jail. He will be arraigned next month. He’s due in court February 22.
By 5:15 a.m., they were outside and picked up. They bounced from one home to another that day in three Orange County cities. Officers then confirmed that the vehicle was the same white GMC Savana van stolen last week, she said. They spent the rest of the day moving between Westminster, Huntington Beach and Santa Ana, where they contacted friends and family and somehow acquired cash and a gun, Hallock said.
The prosecutor said Monday, “At this time, there is insufficient evidence to charge her with any crime”.
Advertisement
It’s not clear where the four men stayed that night, but the next day, Duong stole a van listed on Craigslist in Los Angeles, and the inmates had their hairstyles changed at an El Monte hair salon, Hallock said. If you would like to discuss another topic, look for a relevant article.
