Texas prisoner mistakenly released from jail; manhunt underway: Sheriff's office
A manhunt is underway after an inmate was accidentally released from a Texas jail on Sunday, according to the Harris County Sheriff's Office.
Troy Dugas, a 36-year-old inmate at the Harris County Jail in Houston, Texas, was mistakenly released on Sunday at approximately 4:30 a.m., the sheriff's office said in a press release on Monday.
Dugas had been previously sentenced to five years in state prison for assaulting a woman "with whom the defendant had a dating relationship" on Oct. 16, 2019, according to an indictment obtained by ABC News.
He was also serving a two-year sentence for evading arrest, officials said. He had been held at the Harris County Jail since Aug. 14 on additional local charges that were "subsequently dismissed," the sheriff's office said.
Officials said preliminary indications show that jail staff "did not properly document his state prison sentence in his file, leading to the mistaken assumption that Dugas was eligible for release once his Harris County charges were dismissed."
An investigation will be conducted to determine the circumstances leading to Dugas' "erroneous" release, officials said.
The Harris County Sheriff's Office replied to an ABC News request for comment with no additional information.
Dugas is approximately 6 feet, 1 inch tall, weighs 215 pounds and has a tattoo on his neck, officials said.
Authorities said anyone who has any information regarding Dugas' whereabouts should call 911.
This is not the first time the Harris County Jail has mistakenly released an inmate. On Feb. 20, 21-year-old Justin Tompkins, who had been in jail since December 2022 on a capital murder charge, was set free after staff mistook him for "another inmate with the same name," officials said in a press release. Jail staff realized the mistake the next day and "immediately launched a search," according to officials. Tompkins voluntarily returned to the jail to surrender that evening.
