CONROE, Texas – An inmate who escaped custody in Baytown last week claims he had help from the inside, Houston activist Quanell X said.
Quanell X said Arcade Comeaux admitted that the weapon he used to hold two prison transport guards hostage had been in his cell for at least three weeks.
"[Comeaux] named that guard and he also named someone who is involved in medical who had been giving him medical assistance," Quanell X said.
Prison officials said Comeaux has not shared that information with investigators, so they haven’t made any arrests.
Comeaux, who claimed to be partially paralyzed and wheelchair-bound, was walking without trouble when he was captured Monday morning in northeast Houston.
Authorities are left wondering why prison officials didn’t realize Comeaux was exaggerating his disabilities and where exactly he got the weapon used in his escape.
"If you are in charge of a prison, and you see there is a dispute between medicals and corrections, come to us and ask for laws that would eliminate the controversy,"said John Whitmire, chairman of the Texas Senate Criminal Justice Committee. He is calling for a full investigation of prison and medical staff.
"This feels like the inmate is running the asylum," said a former TDCJ staff member who remembers Comeaux clearly. "He would sit in the food. Of course it would dry and start smelling. He refused to shower, refused to clean himself, basically saying ‘I’m immobile, I need someone to do this for me.’"
The former staff member said Comeaux orchestrated a deliberate campaign of extortion, despite medical reports that he was able to care for himself. He said Comeaux manipulated the system to get health assistance and better housing.
Comeaux is currently incarcerated in the Montgomery County Jail, awaiting a grand jury hearing scheduled for Thursday.
He’s been charged with aggravated kidnapping and felony escape.
Investigators said Comeaux was passing through Conroe on November 30 in a prison transport van, on his way from a unit in Huntsville to one in Beaumont, when he pulled out a gun.
Comeaux held two prison guards hostage, commandeered their van and drove it to the Baytown area, investigators said.
At some point, Comeaux is said to have handcuffed the guards together in the back of the van.
Investigators said he stole the guards’ guns, put on one of their uniforms and fled the van on foot.
It would be a week before he was captured.
Comeaux, who was serving three life sentences at the time of his escape, was found Monday morning when a salesman saw him trying to hitchhike in front of a business on East Little York.
The salesman called HPD, who came and took Comeaux into custody without incident.
He has been in and out of the Texas prison system for 30 years.
Comeaux was first sent to prison in 1979 on three 10-year sentences for rape of a child, aggravated rape of a child and burglary of a building—all out of Harris County. He was paroled four years later.
His parole was revoked and he returned to prison in 1984 to serve a 20-year sentence on a new charge of indecency with a child out of Harris County. He was paroled in 1991 but was in and out of prison for parole violations until 1996.
In June 1998, he was given a life sentence for aggravated sexual assault in Brazos County.
Comeaux was given two extra life sentences after he was convicted of stabbing his wife and another person in 1999. That attack occurred in the Jester III Unit in Fort Bend County when his wife came to visit him. The other person stabbed was a man who tried to stop the attack.
