CROWN POINT, Ind. (AP) — A northwestern Indiana county is seeking repayment of more than $30,000 from a private transport company for a manhunt police mounted after a fugitive escaped while being extradited from Texas.
The Lake County Commissioners unanimously agreed Wednesday to send REDI Transports a letter seeking reimbursement from the Green Bay, Wisconsin, company for the expenses incurred during the two-week-long manhunt and recapture of Leon Taylor.
The Times of Northwest Indiana reports the letter also seeks repayment of the company’s original charge for transporting the 22-year-old Hammond man from Texas to Lake County, where Taylor is a suspect in a Chicago man’s murder.
Taylor escaped Dec. 14 after the van stopped in Gary as an agent with REDI Transports of Green Bay, Wisconsin, was moving him from Texas via O’Hare International Airport to the Lake County Jail.
The agent told authorities Taylor escaped through a van window he had asked to be rolled down so he could “spit.”
But Lake County Sheriff Oscar Martinez Jr. says surveillance footage instead shows Taylor opened a van door and ran off, and wasn’t wearing shackles.
Taylor was recaptured more than two weeks later and taken into custody by officers searching for him in neighboring East Chicago.
