Just after midnight Friday, a corrections monitoring technician in New Orleans stepped away for food. When he left, the Orleans Justice Center had been in lockdown since 10:30 p.m., as it usually was, with inmates expected to be in their cells for the night.
But in the technician’s absence, several inmates began tampering with the door of Cell Delta 1006. They tugged and pulled until it broke open, and snuck into the handicap cell. Then, a man squeezed through a small hole in the wall behind a metal toilet.
Another followed. And another. Seven more would make their way through the tiny opening as 10 inmates fled from the New Orleans jail and into the warm, muggy night. They left a message on the wall on the way out.
“To Easy LoL,” it read.
The men, the youngest 19 years old and the oldest 42, face a wide array of charges including murder, aggravated assault with a firearm and domestic abuse battery. They had prepared for their escape, and possibly had help, officials said.
Toiletries left behind had been used to remove the toilet and sink, as well as bolts in the cell. At least one steel bar protecting plumbing fixtures appeared to have been intentionally cut using a tool, according to law enforcement.
Around 1 a.m., nearly 40 minutes after their escape began, they left the jail through a loading door where supplies were brought in, sprinting and leaping off the dock to freedom in a blur of gray, beige and orange. One wore a blue hat. Two others had orange shoes. One man tripped over a bundle of fabric he was carrying before getting up and running out of the camera’s range.