A teenage prisoner briefly escaped custody and climbed to the roof of a New Orleans jail on Tuesday morning while on his way to court.
Inmate on top of roof of Orleans Parish jail by courthouse taken into custody. .@theadvocateno
Devontay Jenkins, 18, was being escorted from his prison cell to court on Tuesday morning when he requested a bathroom break, the New Orleans Advocate reported.
He then slipped behind the outdoor toilet and ran up a stairwell to the roof of the Old Parish Prison.
Jenkins ran up to the guard tower on top of the building and sat down on the ledge, a spokesperson for the New Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office told the Advocate.
“He just ran up the tower and perched himself on this raised roof,” Stelly said. “He’s got one foot over the ledge.”
Photographs showed Jenkins then took off his orange jumpsuit until it hung off the shackles around his ankles.
Escaped inmate retrieved from ledge behind New Orleans courthouse https://t.co/AcrwprTWiK
Emergency responders quickly reached the guard tower near Jenkins around 8 a.m. local time.
Negotiators spoke with Jenkins for nearly an hour before they were able to safely remove him from the ledge.
The teenager sat on the roof crying and speaking with social workers through the window.
At 8:53 a.m. negotiators offered the inmate a cigarette and, when he was finished, pulled him off the ledge by his arm and underwear.
A man who appears to be an inmate is sitting on top of a criminal courthouse building w/his clothes off @wdsu
The trip to the roof will be added to his record, along with two counts of aggravated assault and 12 counts of simple burglary.
Jenkins was arrested Wednesday after a victim of a double shooting in early June identified Jenkins as their assailant.
At the time of his arrest, around three weeks after the shooting, Jenkins was found hiding in a woman's attic in the 7th Ward district of New Orleans.
He was also wanted in connection with 12 car burglaries in the city.