A 26-year-old man admitted Wednesday to escaping Progreso’s jail and to sexually assaulting a woman.
Adrian Edwardo Garcia entered guilty pleas to one count of sexual assault and one count of escape from custody, court records show.
The man was arrested after he went to the Progreso Police Department on Aug. 5 looking for his lost wallet, which investigators recovered at the scene of a sexual assault that he fled.
A probable cause affidavit for his arrest states that the woman who called police about the assault saw Garcia running away from the scene.
The assault occurred in the early morning hours of Aug. 3.
After he was booked, two police officers working the night shift occasionally checked on Garcia, the jail’s only prisoner that night, while taking calls, according to the charging document.
When the officers arrived back at the police station around 3 a.m. after taking calls, Garcia was gone and there was a large hole in the corner of one of the cells, the probable cause affidavit stated.
“A large part of the sheetrock had been torn off and the wire mesh had been pryed (sic) opened and bent outward,” the charging document read.
A review of surveillance video revealed Garcia escaped through a hole in the ceiling and exited out the south side door of the police department.
A manhunt followed Garcia’s escape that involved Border Patrol and the Hidalgo County Sheriff’s Office.
After an investigator contacted the man’s mother, she said she took Garcia to a hotel in Reynosa to escape, according to the probable cause affidavit.
As part of the plea deal, the Hidalgo County District Attorney’s Office will dismiss one count of sexual assault at his sentencing and a charge of attempted indecency with a child will remain unadjudicated, court records show.
