Local authorities are searching for an inmate after he escaped from the Jessamine County Detention Center on Thursday.
Jonathan M. Owens, 25, had been serving a one-year sentence for cold checks, jailer Jon Sallee said, and was a work-release inmate staying in the restricted-custody center. With more cold-check charges pending, jail officials were moving him to the main facility around 12:30 p.m. Thursday when he ran out of the building and fled on foot.
“He was recently interviewed by Nicholasville police and had more charges coming, so we were transporting him from our restricted-custody center to our main facility when he got away and ran out the door,” Sallee said.
Sallee said the doors to the restricted-custody center, used for work-release inmates, are not locked and that Owens ran while in the process of packing his belongings. He was last seen running toward Maple Street, Sallee said.
Jail officials immediately contacted the Nicholasville Police Department and the Jessamine County Sheriff’s Office and a search of the area was performed, Sallee said. Lexington police were also contacted for use of their tracking dogs.
