August 3, 1949
A County Jail prisoner, awaiting transfer to the state penitentiary to serve a life sentence under the habitual criminal act, failed Tuesday in an escape attempt.
The prisoner, 23-year-old Juan Valenzuela, of El Paso, broke his right ankle in attempting to climb down a rope made of blanket strips from the fifth floor to the third floor of the courthouse.
Deputy Sheriff Jimmy Hicks said Valenzuela and 19 other prisoners were removed from the tank on the fifth floor Tuesday afternoon to a sun porch to enable jailers to make their regular search of the tank for concealed weapons.
Hicks said Valenzuela broke a bar with a loose piece of lumber and began to climb to the roof of the third floor of the courthouse. His ankle was broken in the drop from the rope to the floor.
District Clerk J. C. Orgain notified the Sheriff’s Department when he noticed the blanket strips from the window of his third-floor office.
Valenzuela was under guard at City-County Hospital Tuesday night pending an operation on his ankle.
No other prisoner attempted to escape, Hicks said, but the building was surrounded by sheriff’s deputies after the first alarm.
August 3, 1949?
Posted by: Jerry | July 09, 2009 at 08:46 AM