3 Inmates Injured When Stolen Van Crashes During Escape

Three escaping prisoners were injured, two seriously, over the weekend when their stolen van crashed during a high-speed chase near Acton, authorities said.

The inmates, who were being extradited from jails and prisons in the Los Angeles area to correctional facilities in Nevada, Utah and other Western states, took the van during a rest stop after guards left the keys in the ignition.

About 11:40 p.m. Saturday, the driver of the van, operated by Denver-based Extradition International, stopped at a mini-mart on Sand Canyon Road near the Antelope Valley Freeway to let the nine male prisoners in the van use the restroom.

Apparently while the two guards weren’t looking, two inmates jumped in the front seat, where the keys were dangling from the ignition, said Sgt. Russell Brown of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. A third inmate was in the back of the van but tried to convince the other two not to escape, authorities said. The van then peeled out down the highway.

The guards left on the side of the road called 911, and two California Highway Patrol officers started chasing the van.

Inmate Geoffrey Johnson, 41, was at the wheel when the van spun out of control, slamming into a dirt embankment and rolling near Santiago and Soledad Canyon roads. Johnson, a Utah state prisoner, was ejected from the van and remained hospitalized in serious condition Sunday night.

Billy Freeman, 41, a Nevada state prisoner who was in the front seat, was also injured in the crash and remained in serious condition.

Both face charges of escape, kidnapping, grand theft and felony evading, Brown said.

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Robert Nottingham, the third prisoner, who was seated in the back of the van, was treated for minor injuries and released. The other six inmates were not involved and remain in custody.

A spokesman for Extradition International acknowledged that the incident showed “an error in judgment.”

“The guards should not have had [as many of] the inmates out of the truck,” said S.L. Rutherford, an executive at Extradition International. “They made a mistake.”