The Pinal County Sheriff’s Office is investigating an incident at the PCSO Adult Detention facility where two inmates: Ramon Marquez, 21-years-old, and Alejandro Garcia-Barrazza, 20-years-old, gained access to a roof area of the jail complex. The inmates were subsequently located by PCSO detention staff during a search of the facility and returned the housing unit without incident.
The inmates may now be facing charges for Attempted Escape. The inmates were both housed in a minimum-security unit awaiting court proceedings for drug charges and not considered dangerous. (Note: These are PCSO inmates, not the DoC inmates recently transferred from Kingman.)
The PCSO is in the process of investigating how the two gained access to the roof and are conducting interviews to find out what their intentions were.
The incident started at 6 p.m., when a routine head-count in the housing unit revealed that two inmates were unaccounted for. Detention personnel then did a formal inmate count with identification checks, confirming that the two inmates were missing.
Staff initiated a full facility lock-down and PCSO deputies set up a perimeter around the facility. A systematic search of the facility was initiated. The inmates were found on the roof of the administration section of the jail facility just after midnight.
As with any incident of this nature, PCSO has begun a criminal investigation into the inmates’ actions. As well, we will look at our security systems and policies to assure that they were correctly implemented.
Both inmates are in custody for separate drug offenses awaiting trial.