Lawyer says worker accused of helping New Orleans jailbreak was unclogging toilet, not aiding escape

NEW ORLEANS – A idiosyncratic charged with aiding the New Orleans jailbreak by 10 prisoners unopen disconnected h2o to unclog a toilet, not to let the men to chopped the tube to make an opening for their escape, the employee's lawyer told The Associated Press connected Wednesday.

Sterling Williams, a 33-year-old attraction idiosyncratic astatine the jail, was arrested Tuesday successful transportation with the jailbreak.

Authorities antecedently said that Williams had been instructed by 1 of the inmates to crook disconnected the h2o to a toilet. Behind the toilet was a spread that 10 men slipped done successful Friday’s escape.

“It would look evident to maine that filling up the toilet, clogging the toilet, was a information of the escapee’s plan,” lawyer Michael Kennedy said. “They would cognize that whoever the attraction idiosyncratic was would person to crook disconnected the h2o ... due to the fact that it was overflowing into the tier.”

Williams told instrumentality enforcement during an interrogation that an inmate had threatened to “shank” him if helium did not crook disconnected the water, authorities said.

Williams had plentifulness of accidental to not lone study the menace but besides the flight plan, authorities said. They asserted that due to the fact that Williams turned the h2o off, the inmates were “able to successfully marque good” connected their escape.

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