Inmate Who Faked Paralysis Recaptured

SOURCE: http://news.aol.com/article/escaped-inmate-arcade-joseph-comeau-jr/790631

HOUSTON (Dec. 7) -- A convicted sex offender who led authorities on a weeklong manhunt after pulling off a daring escape during a prison transfer was captured Monday after a salesman recognized the inmate outside his Houston business and called police.

Arcade Joseph Comeaux Jr. was caught after authorities received a phone tip that he was in northeast Houston, said Alfredo Perez, a spokesman for the U.S. Marshals Service. The area is heavily wooded but includes various businesses, a charter school and some residential neighborhoods.

Comeaux, 49, was in a wheelchair Nov. 30 when he pulled a gun on two guards during a transfer from a prison unit in Huntsville to one in Beaumont. The guards were released after being forced to drive to the Baytown area. Comeaux took their weapons, handcuffed them together and ran away.

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice is still investigating how Comeaux got the pistol and why he was allowed to use a wheelchair since he was able to flee on foot.

Comeaux was arrested about 25 miles northwest of Baytown.
He had two pistols on him, but investigators don't know if they were the same ones he took from the guards, Perez said. Comeaux also took one of the guard's gray uniforms and black boots, Perez said.

Brian Boyd, a salesman at a company that rents and sells cranes, said he was outside his business when he spotted Comeaux standing in a ditch by the side of the road, trying to hitchhike.

Comeaux then walked along the road, came to the company's front door and asked if he could use the phone, Boyd said.

"He was all muddy, wearing black clothing," Boyd said. "He was real calm. He looked just wiped out. He had both pants legs taped up."

The barefoot Comeaux sat on the curb outside the building while Boyd went inside. Boyd said he was 80 percent certain the man was the escaped prisoner, but he looked up his picture on the Internet to make sure and then called Houston police.

By the time Boyd came outside, Comeaux had walked to the business next door, a company that sells equipment to the oil and gas industry.

Inside, he asked employees if he could make a telephone call, said Kathy Alexander, a manager at the company.

After talking on the phone, Comeaux asked if someone could call him a cab. Alexander said the employees gave him some coffee and had him wait in the front lobby.

"Brian (Boyd) came by and said he had called the police because he suspected it was the escapee," Alexander said. "He sat out there in our foyer, drinking his coffee until the police came in and arrested him."

Alexander said she wasn't frightened while Comeaux was in her office because he "wasn't acting in a threatening manner" but got scared after later finding out he had two guns on him.

Comeaux was serving a life prison term for a 1998 aggravated sexual assault conviction in Brazos County, northwest of Houston.

The 6-foot, 200-pound Comeaux has been in and out of the Texas prison system for the last 30 years on various charges, including rape of a child, indecency with a child and burglary.