INDIAN RIVER COUNTY — U.S. Marshals, the Indian River County Sheriff’s Office, local police departments and other agencies are searching for two men who escaped this morning from the maximum security area of the county jail. Both men are high risk inmates and considered dangerous.
Whether the men have weapons was not immediately known. The escaped cellmates are Leviticus Uriah Taylor, 25, and Rondell Reed, 51.
Sheriff Deryl Loar said outside the Indian River County Jail that the escape was a “very elaborate scheme” and “very detailed.”
“This is not something that happened overnight,” Sheriff Loar said.
He declined to provide details pertaining to the escape.
Sheriff’s spokesman Jeff Luther said prior to the press conference that it was thought the men escaped via a vent and climbed either a 12-foot brick wall or 12-foot fence, both topped with razor wire.
Taylor was found guilty in September of murder in a case from 2009 where he and four others were accused of hitting a man in the head with a cinder block to rob him.
Reed is accused of shooting and killing the owner of Jim’s Auto on US 1 earlier this year. He previously spent 21 years in “super maximum custody” in Texas following an escape from a North Carolina prison and shoot-out with law enforcement.
Sheriff Loar said investigators are reviewing all available surveillance footage and have extended the search for the men outside the jail.
Checkpoints have been established throughout the area. Deputies are questioning drivers.
The sheriff is asking the public to keep a look out for the two men and to call 911 if they think they see the men.
Taylor is described as a 25-year-old black male with black, close-cropped hair and brown eyes standing 5 feet 7 inches and weighing 140 pounds.
Reed is a 52-year-old white male with gray hair and brown eyes standing 5 feet 11 inches and weighing 180 pounds. He is heavily tattooed.