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The domestic violence defendant was sentenced to five years in prison after he let a drug convict pose as him to fool corrections deputies into releasing him.
By CHRIS TISCH, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times, published September 29, 2002
LARGO -- Collie Cox probably wouldn't have gone along with the plan if he knew that the criminal charges against him were crumbling.
Cox was in the Pinellas County Jail on charges of domestic violence in the spring. His girlfriend had accused him of breaking into the home they once shared and hurting her. But the woman's story was losing credibility. Eventually, prosecutors would drop the charges.
If Cox had known that, he probably wouldn't have agreed to help Richard Lloyd escape from jail. Lloyd, who had been sentenced to 30 years in prison on drug charges and was facing another 30 on an armed robbery charge, approached Cox with a plan to spring himself from jail.
Lloyd called his sister and asked her to come bail out Cox, who he said was a friend. After she posted bail, Cox was sent to be discharged from the jail.
But it wasn't Cox who stood before corrections deputies. It was Lloyd.
Lloyd, 30, had shaved his hair short and grew a goatee so he would look like Cox, 34. Both men are about 5-foot-9 and 150 pounds. Lloyd memorized Cox's date of birth and Social Security number, and switched his identification wrist band with Cox.
Before deputies could realize the trick, Lloyd was long gone.
His taste of freedom didn't last long, though. After Lloyd called an old girlfriend from an acquaintance's house in St. Petersburg, the woman called the sheriff's office.
Her caller ID captured the phone number, which she provided to deputies, said Cpl. Larry Weglarz of the Sheriff's Office. Deputies found Lloyd at that house, hiding in a closet under a pile of clothes.
He had been out about 18 hours. On the way back to the jail, Lloyd told the arresting deputy: "I'm doing 30 years. I've got nothing to lose."
Now, Lloyd has been convicted of the armed robbery and faces a total prison sentence of 60 years. He also received 30 years for the jail escape, but that sentence will run concurrent with his other sentences.
John Banks, another man who helped Lloyd after he slipped out of jail, also was arrested and charged with aiding an escape. He pleaded guilty to the charge and was sentenced to three years in prison.
And Collie Cox, who would be a free man right now if not for agreeing to help Richard Lloyd?
He pleaded guilty to an aiding escape charge and was sentenced to five years in prison. He received credit for 187 days he already had served in jail.
He apparently agreed to switch places with Lloyd because of a promise of about $1,000. He told the judge while he was being sentenced that he had been double-crossed, said Brian Daniels, who prosecuted the three men.
"It really was dumb," Daniels said.
An internal investigation at the jail determined that deputies did nothing wrong, but were simply tricked by a sophisticated ruse, sheriff's officials said.
The switcheroo wouldn't work today. The jail has installed facial recognition technology that should prevent the trick from succeeding. Sheriff Everett Rice was working on getting the technology installed even before the escape.
"The sheriff wanted it at the jail," said Detective Cal Dennie of the Sheriff's Office. "The sheriff was a proponent of that long before this happened."
-- Chris Tisch can be reached at (727) 445-4156 or tisch@sptimes.com.