Vanderburgh County Sheriff Dave Wedding shared new details on Tuesday morning about the arrest of a fugitive inmate with an Alabama district attorney, who authorities say died by suicide.
Inmate Casey White speaks freely with investigators, the sheriff told DailyExpertNews’s Miguel Marquez.
“He was quite frank with the investigators last night. They had quite a long interview,” said Wedding. The sheriff did not share details of the interview.
The sheriff tells DailyExpertNews that during the chase, corrections officer Vicky White was on the phone with emergency rooms and indicated she had a gun to her head.
When authorities arrived the gun had gone off, the sheriff said:
According to the “initial investigation,” Wedding said authorities “believe she took her own life, but we will wait for the coroner to examine the body to make a confirmation.”
He described several law enforcement agencies, including US Marshall task forces from several states, working frantically taking tips and watching surveillance videos leading up to when authorities saw the Cadillac the couple was allegedly in.
“What helped us was that the Cadillac we were looking for was in a hotel parking lot just south of the sheriff’s office,” he said.
“When our task force officers went to the hotel, it took a very short time for them to intercept them in the vehicle and the chase began,” he told DailyExpertNews’s Marquez.
He said the task force intercepted the vehicle fleeing north on a highway in what he described as a close pursuit.
“They drove through a factory parking lot and went through a grassy field, our task force officers rammed into the vehicle and pushed them into a ditch,” he added.
At that time, investigators approached the vehicle to investigate, he said.
“She was unconscious with a gunshot wound to her head and the male suspect gave up without incident,” Wedding said.
His office is consulting with the local district attorney to review events in Evansville, Vandenburg County, he said.
“If they choose not to press charges, we will immediately contact Alabama to see if we can return the subject to the home state,” he said.
In the end, the sheriff called it a “good day for law enforcement.”
“Often you have these unusual cases, severe cases and they go on for days without being resolved,” he said.
“From the time we started our investigation to the time we completed this, things moved quickly and no one was injured other than the suspect, so it’s a good day for the police,” he continued.