Vancleave man in custody after escaping from police at hospital

Published 6:42 pm Wednesday, March 21, 2007

A Vancleave man is in custody Tuesday after bolting from a wheelchair at Singing River Hospital to escape police custody.

Clifford Anthony Walsh, 33, had complained of chest pains to deputies who arrested him Sunday for grand larceny in the theft of a truck in the Three Rivers area. He was taken to the hospital’s emergency room where he was treated for several hours.

“The hospital required him to be escorted out in a wheelchair,” Jackson County Sheriff’s Lt. Ken McClenic said. “While the officer was attempting to unlock the doors and get him in the back of the patrol car — he fled.”

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Sgt. Cecil Locke said the hospital did not find any evidence of a heart attack or chest related conditions.

Police searched the area near the hospital but were unable to find Walsh until Tuesday.

“We were up in Three Rivers this morning looking for him when we got information that he was on Morris Street in Moss Point,” Sheriff Mike Byrd said. “He was at somebody’s house. When they read about it in the paper, they turned him in. The man said ‘I’m not going to work until y’all come get him.’”