'I Couldn't Believe How Easy It Was,' Inmate Boasts After Dallas Jailbreak

An inmate who escaped from the Dallas County jail over the weekend boasted to a TV station Monday that it was ridiculously “easy.”

“I couldn’t believe how easy it was,” Daniel Brown told CBS 11, the local CBS affiliate. “You wouldn’t think that it would be that easy … that someone could just walk out.”

“I was working sanitation,” Brown said, explaining how he escaped from the jail’s kitchen, where he had been assigned to work. “So we took all the trash to the compactor throughout the day. I snuck in there and I hid.”

Brown said he hid for two minutes, before sliding through a small, rusty opening to freedom. Brown’s girlfriend, Diesha Owens, was waiting nearby with a getaway car, police said. But police tracked Owens’ cellphone to a Motel 6 in Grand Prairie, 12 miles from the jail, where they recaptured Brown.

Brown had been in jail since March on a theft charge, as well as a parole violation. He had been facing a year behind bars, but now faces up to 10, according to the report.

After his escape, officials reviewed recordings of his jail telephone calls and realized that Brown and Owens plotted the escape weeks in advance. Owens, who has not yet been arrested, will be charged with facilitating Owens’ escape, according to the Dallas Morning News.

The Dallas County Jail is one of the largest municipal jails in the country, holding roughly 5,000 inmates. By way of comparison, the Men’s Central Jail in Los Angeles holds almost 5,300 inmates and Rikers Island in New York City currently holds less than 9,000.

“You know those choices have been made,” Brown said, implying that he did not regret his actions, though he faces 10 more years in prison for one day of freedom. “So I can’t ponder in my past.”'

[Dallas County Sheriff]