Inside manhunt for escapee, jailer
WASHINGTON >> It was about three hours after sheriff's officials in Alabama realized a capital murder suspect and a senior jail official who had taken him for a mental health evaluation had disappeared when Sheriff Rick Singleton called in the U.S. marshals.
At first, law enforcement officials believed the suspect, Casey White, might have kidnapped Vicky White, assistant director of corrections for Lauderdale County and a 17-year veteran of the sheriff's office. (The two were not married or otherwise related.) But they quickly learned that her cover story was phony and a manhunt began.
U.S. Marshal Marty Keely sprung the Gulf Coast Regional Fugitive Task Force into action.
Keely's account of the 11-day search, in an interview with The Associated Press, is the most detailed and comprehensive account to date of the U.S. Marshals Service investigation in a nationwide manhunt that ended with Vicky White dead, Casey White back in custody and law enforcement agencies trying to piece together how the escape could have happened.
The task force received its first lead when a fellow jail worker reported that Vicky White had called to ask the coworker to pick her up at an Academy Sports + Outdoors store in Florence, Alabama. White said she had locked her keys in her car and needed a ride to work, Keely said.
In the parking lot of the sporting goods store, investigators found White's patrol car — the same vehicle in which she left the sheriff's office hours earlier with a handcuffed Casey White in the backseat, according to Keely. It was also where surveillance video showed she had staged a getaway vehicle, an orange Ford Edge purchased just days before the escape with a fistful of cash.
The investigators learned from other inmates that Vicky White had a “special relationship” with Casey White and the two were involved in a “jailhouse romance,” officials have said. Weeks before the escape she sold her house for $95,000, far below the market value, sold her car and filed for retirement, Keely said. She had also bought an AR-15 rifle and a shotgun to add to her 9mm service weapon and a .45-caliber pistol investigators believe she had.
Other clues also emerged: She bought men's clothes at a local Kohl's store and had also visited a store that sold sex toys.
They also learned Vicky White left the jail with Casey White previously in what investigators believe was a dry run for the escape, two law enforcement officials told the AP. She'd taken him out of the jail for about 40 minutes, the officials said. The officials spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss details of the investigation.
Tips flowed in to the Marshals Service and sheriff's officials but nothing panned out until a tow truck driver from Tennessee called. He had towed the Ford Edge three or four days earlier and it was still in his tow yard, Keely said.
Authorities scoured rural Tennessee looking for clues and showing photos of Vicky and Casey. They discovered a home with a few cars and trucks for sale on the lawn, Keely said. The homeowner instantly recognized a photo of Casey White and helped authorities piece together what had happened. He told investigators he sold White a Ford F-150 pickup truck for cash. The truck didn't have license plates, but White didn't care, the man told authorities.
During the sale, a woman in an orange Ford pulled up and the two drove off trailing one another, the man told authorities. And the homeowner provided one more clue — the pickup truck's vehicle identification number, or VIN, according to Keely.
The two abandoned the Ford Edge and made their way to Evansville, Indiana, where Casey White eventually abandoned the pickup in the bay of a car wash.
In Evansville, investigators believe, the two paid a homeless man to use his identification to rent them a hotel room, paying cash upfront for a 14-day stay. They were living under the assumed alias in the motel and had acquired a third car, a Cadillac sedan.