The murder suspect and his jailer who evaded authorities for more than a week after walking out of an Alabama lockup were carrying $29,000 in cash, four handguns and an AR-15 rifle and were prepared for a shootout when they were captured, an Indiana sheriff said Tuesday.
The escaped convict Casey White showed no remorse over the death of jail official Vicky White, who was found mortally wounded with a gun in her hand on Monday after a brief car chase, Vanderburgh County Sheriff Dave Wedding said. Authorities don’t believe Casey White shot Vicky White, but a coroner will make the final determination, he said.
Casey White, 38, surrendered without a fight, saying he didn’t kill the woman he called his wife. He appeared by video Tuesday in an Indiana courtroom where he waived extradition, and authorities said he’ll be swiftly sent back to Alabama.
The end of the manhunt did little to answer lingering questions surrounding the jailbreak: Why would a long-respected jail official on the eve of her retirement give up everything to help a dangerous felon escape? What did they do while they evaded authorities for roughly eleven days? And when they were finally surrounded, did she really pull the trigger to end her own life?
Vicky White, 56, was pronounced dead at a hospital on Monday after the Cadillac she was driving was pushed by U.S. Marshals task force members into a ditch where it ended up on its side, the sheriff in Evansville, Indiana said. They were nearly 300 miles from the Alabama jail where he had been awaiting trial for capital murder.
An attorney representing White in that case, Jamy Poss, declined comment Tuesday, saying he was still trying to find out what had happened in Indiana.
NBC’s “Today” show reported Tuesday that federal marshals said Casey White told officers at the scene, “Please help my wife. She just shot herself in the head and I didn’t do it.” The two Whites were not related, let alone married, officials said.
Before Vanderburgh County Coroner Steve Lockyear announced her death, the sheriff in Alabama had said he hoped to get answers from his once trusted jail employee.
“I had every bit of trust in Vicky White. She has been an exemplary employee. What in the world provoked her, prompted her to pull a stunt like this? I don’t know. I don’t know if we’ll ever know,” Lauderdale County Sheriff Rick Singleton said.
Authorities closed in after the manager of a car wash said he told U.S. Marshals on Sunday that a man closely resembling Casey White had been recorded by a surveillance camera getting out of a 2006 Ford F-150 pickup truck.
After locating the F-150, authorities got information that the two may have then gotten into a beige 2006 Cadillac, U.S. Marshal Marty Keely told “Good Morning America.”
“We dispatched our people into the area of the car wash and observed the vehicle at a hotel,” Keely said.
Members of a U.S. Marshals task force went to investigate, leading to a brief chase, Vanderburgh County Sheriff Dave Wedding said on “Today.”
“The pursuit was very short. It went up a major artery here in Vanderburgh County and they cut across a parking lot at a large factory. They were in a grassy area so three of our task force members actually rammed the vehicle, pushed it into a ditch so it ended up on its side. As they approached the vehicle it was obvious that the female driver was unconscious and still had a weapon in her hand. And they removed the murderer from the vehicle simultaneously,” Wedding said.
Wedding said it has not been officially determined that Vicky White did in fact take her own life.
