DOWNTOWN TOLEDO -- 29-year-old Robert Harris is back in jail, about 24 hours after he walked out. According to detectives, a tip to Crimestopper led the Gang Youth Unit to a house in the 800th block of Division street, where officers arrested Harris around 3:30. They took him to the Public Safety Building in downtown Toledo for questioning.
Investigators say a case of "human error" let Harris out of jail on Tuesday, but the jail's administrator says the escape also illustrates the need for a better surveillance video system in the Lucas County lock-up.
On Wednesday, jail supervisors let News 11 see surveillance video of Harris when he was booked into the jail on June 5th on a bank robbery charge. Harris was eventually moved to a minimum security area called the "Sober Living Unit" where inmates considered the least dangerous stay in a dormitory-style lockup, and sleep on cots.
Some question whether a man suspected of bank robbery should have been staying in that part of the jail. "We are going to look at some of the people that we put in the 'Sober Living Unit' and maybe will not put federal prisoners in there anymore," said Jim O'Neal, the administrator of the Lucas County Jail.
On Tuesday, investigators say Harris grabbed a master key that was left by a male corrections officer on a desk in the unit. Harris was then able to unlock a door on the second floor and then take a service elevator down to the first floor, and freedom. "The service elevator is not a secured elevator and he went right out probably on the first floor and walked out," said O'Neal.
Making matters worse, Harris is suspected of robbing a Charter One Bank shortly after his escape. A surveillance picture shows a man that appears to be Harris. "We don't want the security of the community put at risk in any way, shape or form," said Tina Skeldon-Wozniak, a Lucas County Commissioner.
Commissioners say plans are in the works to improve security at the jail. Video visitation units have already been installed to prevent contraband from getting to inmates, but, jail officials say they're in desperate need of a new video camera system. Some monitors are nearly 30 years old and only show blurry images, and most of the cameras do not have good coverage and do not record.
The county is planning on installing a new system costing in the neighborhood of a half-million dollars. "The surveillance cameras are the number one priority coming in," said Skeldon-Wozniak, "Within about a 9-month period, the architecture is going to be hired to implement the plan to put the surveillance cameras in."
"I couldn't believe he got away," said a woman who we tracked down and did not want to be identified. She was in front of Harris's last know address on Byrneport Drive, the same apartment where his former girlfriend Jamie lives. She's the mother of Harris's 5 year-old daughter. "Actually she's devastated," said the anonymous woman.
The woman said she's best friends with Harris' girlfriend and that she can't understand how he broke out of jail. "I couldn't have possibly think he would get out with the county sheriffs on him," she questioned.
