SAN DIEGO (Border Report) — A man serving a 20-year sentence has been missing since Wednesday and is believed to have escaped from the El Hongo Penitentiary, a maximum-security prison located about 2 miles south of the U.S.-Mexico border east of Tijuana.
The state prison is reporting that an inmate has been unaccounted for since late Wednesday night when guards could not locate him inside his cell or anywhere on the grounds of the
facility.
The people who run the penitentiary have not released the inmate’s name or information about why he was being held.
According to the ZETA Weekly in Tijuana, the inmate is Edgar Zavala, who was being held in an area reserved for pedophiles and men convicted of sexual assault or abuse.
ZETA is also reporting that Zavala had spent several days scraping and digging around a 16-by-20-inch window located in the shower area and was able to escape through this opening at 9 p.m. Wednesday.
A source inside the prison, Zeta reports, said the inmate was able to evade guards outside because the K-9 units were not on patrol when he scaled a wall between two observation towers and ran into the night.
The prison reportedly believes Zavala got help from at least 30 fellow inmates who are being held as accomplices.
Officially, the prison says the inmate is unaccounted for and that guards are still searching the facility to see if they can find him.
