LANSING, Mich. — A prisoner who police say escaped from a moving transport van Wednesday afternoon died later that day from his injuries, the Ingham County Sheriff's Office said Thursday morning.
The inmate has been identified as Marquis Oliver, 21, from Lansing.
"It does not appear Mr. Oliver was struck by any vehicles, rather his injuries were a result of him jumping from the van," Sheriff Scott Wriggelsworth said in a news release.
However, new information has come out about the van that was transporting the inmates.
Wriggelsworth told News 10 that the van was relatively new and hadn't been thoroughly checked, and it turns out there was a major security flaw.
State police have taken over the investigation into the attempted escape on US-127 Wednesday, but the sheriff said he is taking full responsibility.
"We've done thousands upon thousands upon thousands of trips in these vans," Wriggelsworth said.
This trip was different though. Oliver was able to open the van door and jump out as it headed south on US-127 toward Mason.
"There was nothing that stuck out. He was seated in a row by himself just behind the door so he did have to scoot himself up a couple feet to be able to reach the door," Wriggelsworth said. "He had leg shackles on and belly chains so you still have a little bit of access to use your hands. I don't think anybody was paying all that much attention to him."
Wriggelsworth said features in the van weren't quite right. The van is made for dual transport, which means it can be used to move inmates around or carry deputies to big events.
So unlike other transport vans, it doesn't have a steel cage blocking the door handle and the handle was not supposed to work from the inside.
"So when we order cars, we order them with the back seat handles disengaged so that's the standard theme in law enforcement. The backseat of cars don't work in police cars or patrol cars," Wriggelsworth said. "With the van like I talked about --our vans have historically had steel cages in them so you can't even access that so I don't think that those handles were ever disengaged."
The van has only been in service for about a week. Wriggelsworth said no one in the sheriff's office checked to see if the door handles worked from the inside.
"Of course there'd be a chance to check it before... it had yet been used in service yesterday, but again those doors (that) are in patrol cars are disengaged and all our other vans were built differently so you couldn't access that handle," Wriggelsworth said. "If I could go back to yesterday morning, I'd had that handle disengaged but unfortunately it wasn't. It was supposed to not be engaged and ultimately that would be my responsibility as sheriff," Wriggelsworth said.
The van was traveling at highway speeds at the time of the incident, Wriggelsworth said. The speed limit on US-127 is 70 mph.
Oliver had been in jail for a variety of charges since January, according to a news release.
"Mr. Oliver was gravely injured and lifesaving measures were attempted by several police officers," Wriggelsworth said.
Oliver was transported to Sparrow Hospital where he later died.
The incident caused southbound lanes of US-127 near Mount Hope to close for hours.
Wriggelsworth said the inmate was riding in the sheriff's transport unit, along with 10 others, heading back to the jail from the Veterans Memorial Courthouse, when Oliver jumped.
Oliver was the only person to jump. He was able to somehow able to open the sliding door of the van, Wriggelsworth said. How that happened is under investigation.
Glenn Irby, 42, of Lansing, saw police with their guns drawn near the van at a time he suspects must have been minutes after the inmate jumped out of the vehicle.
Irby was driving along northbound US-127 at that time with his girlfriend, Jamie Cassidy, and sensed a dangerous situation immediately.
"We were driving north on 127 just past Jolly Road and a cop car went buzzing by and I said "who is he chasing?" And then we looked and there was a van stopped with three Lansing cop cars behind and I say "well what did they do?" Irby said. "And so as we drove up I saw it was a transport vehicle and looked and the back door was open. We saw two police officers standing there with their hands on their hip as if they were ready to draw their guns and they were running off on to something. The others look like they were running after somebody."
As Irby looked in the opposite direction, he saw three police vehicles parked behind the van near the highway median and armed police searching a wooded area near the shoulder.
“I immediately thought somebody escaped,” Irby said. “And it wasn’t like police were just standing around. They were going somewhere looking for something.”
"On behalf of the entire Sheriff’s Office, we extend our heartfelt condolences to the family of Mr. Oliver. We will continue to work with the Michigan State Police to determine a cause of this tragic event," Wriggelsworth said.
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