In what was probably a nightmare scenario for authorities, an escaped inmate got into a standoff with police just blocks from the Democratic National Convention.
The inmate escaped from Mississippi and made his way to Chicago where he had an hours-long intense confrontation with police in a restaurant. Authorities say Joshua Zimmerman was wanted for murder and robbery. He hid inside the Seafood Junction restaurant near the DNC. He had been working at the restaurant up until authorities zeroed in on him.
ABC7 Chicago shows footage from the arrest. When authorities tried to arrest him, the escaped inmate ended up barricading himself inside of the ceiling. Cops have been searching for Zimmerman since he escaped from a Hernando, Mississippi, courthouse on June 14. The escaped inmate swapped out his jail attire for normal clothes and walked through an unguarded door at the court house.
He was standing trial for the attempted murder of an elderly man who hired him to do some work around his house. Authorities also charged him with the murder of a woman last year as well.
Escaped Inmate Found In Chicago
Justin Smith, chief deputy of the DeSoto County Sheriff's Office, opened up about his capture. Zimmerman wasn't armed nd didn't have any hostages.
"We know that he's by himself in there. There's no innocent civilians. It's only Zimmerman inside the building," he clarified."We just want to talk to him. We want to find out what happened. We're parsing together information. And he's the center of the puzzle. So having him in our hands will give us some really good leads on how all this transpired and if he did have assistance."
Smith wanted to bring Zimmerman back to Mississippi. As pointed out above, authorities are very interested to learn more about how the escaped inmate managed to escape. After all, there was a hole in their defenses.
However, Zimmerman probably didn't want to go with authorities. He's facing some serious crimes down in Mississippi. There was also plans to move him to Texas for the murder charge there. At this time, authorities didn't reveal how they zeroed in on the escaped inmate.
