By NEAL WAGNER / City Editor

Alabaster police arrested a 19-year-old Maylene man Oct. 28 after officers said he escaped from custody while serving a brief sentence in the Alabaster City Jail.

Jacob Michael Swindle was charged with one count of second-degree escape and one count of third-degree theft of property one day after Alabaster police Deputy Chief Curtis Rigney said Swindle escaped between 1-2 p.m. while washing cars outside the police department on Oct. 27.

“He was a trusty, and was outside washing cars,” Rigney said, noting Swindle was serving a brief sentence in the city jail, likely on traffic-related charges. “He just decided that he didn’t want to be there anymore, and just walked off.”

According to the code of Alabama, a second-degree escape charge comes when a person “escapes or attempts to escape from penal facility,” but does not use or threaten physical force or a deadly weapon while doing so. Second-degree escape is a Class C felony.

According to Alabaster police records, Swindle was charged with third-degree theft of property because he escaped wearing an “orange snap-button jumpsuit issued by the Alabaster Police Department Jail” valued at $35. Third-degree theft of property is a class A misdemeanor.

Rigney said officers discovered Swindle at his mother’s residence in McCalla several hours after the escape occurred.

“We caught him at his mother’s house the next day in McCalla. I think we apprehended him about 10 or 12 hours after the incident occurred,” Rigney added.

After police apprehended Swindle, they transferred him from the Alabaster City Jail to the Shelby County Jail. As of Nov. 1, Swindle was being held in the Shelby County Jail on bonds totaling $11,000.