Two inmates escape from Indian Springs

David Kihara

Thursday, Sept. 29, 2005 | 10:08 a.m.

Two prisoners serving time for robbery at the minimum security Indian Springs Conservation Camp walked away from the camp on Tuesday night and were still on the loose this morning, prison authorities said.

Marvin Robinson, 20, and Donald Jordan, 19, escaped the work camp sometime after 8:45 p.m., the Nevada Department of Corrections announced Wednesday afternoon.

Robinson was serving 24 to 60 months for a robbery conviction. Jordan, convicted of robbery and grand larceny, was serving a 26- to 120-month sentence. Both would have been eligible for parole in about one year, according to prison records.

The camp from which they walked away is about 40 miles northwest of Las Vegas and about nine miles from the town of Indian Springs.

Lt. John Harwood, manager at the Indian Springs Conservation Camp, said the escape was under investigation. He refused to provide more information.

"Just because a person walked away from a correctional facility doesn't mean there was a mistake made on the part of the department of corrections," said Glen Whorton, who took over as director of the department of corrections on Sept. 15 after former director Jackie Crawford stepped down because of medical issues. Crawford was also under fire for a number of escapes from the prison system and early releases of prisoners.

Robinson is 6 feet 2 inches and weighs 182 pounds. He has multiple tattoos on his arms, including "Marv" on his upper left arm, "Alumni" on his left forearm, "Fats" on his right upper arm and "Ridaz" on his right forearm.

Jordan is 6 feet tall and wighs 205 pounds. He has "39th Street" tattooed on the underside of his left forearm, the prison said.

Robinson and Jordan are believed to be traveling together and were wearing blue prison uniforms.

The camp has a fence around it, but the fence is used to mark property, not to detain inmates, Whorton said.

The camp has fewer guards or supervisors than a regular prison, has no guard towers and has no gates or barriers to keep the prisoners inside.

There are 10 work camps in Nevada that house more than 1,000 inmates total. Indian Springs has about 240 inmates, Whorton said. He said work camps like Indian Springs allow prisoners to work in the community fighting fires or performing other jobs.

It is also significantly less expensive to house inmates at work camps because of the reduced staff and lower maintenance costs, Whorton said, who add that that the escape will likely not lead to a change in prison policies.

"The policies are not being revised or looked at. We could screw this thing down to the point where no one would escape, but in order to do that we need the staff and facilities for that," he said.

Whorton said the prisoners in the correctional system are allowed to go to a work camp such as Indian Springs if they have a good disciplinary record and a probability that they will be released in 36 months.

The camps also allow prisoners to earn good time credits that could lead to an early release, he said.

Violent inmates are allowed to be housed at work camps as long as at least one year has elapsed since their crimes, he said.

Any inmate who walks away from the camp and is caught again will be prosecuted and will never again have the chance to be housed in a minimum-security facility, he said.

"The consequences of escape are more serious than remaining in that privileged situation," he said. "When they walk away, we neither forgive nor forget."

At least four inmates at Indian Springs have fled the camp since 1996. In December 2004, Danny Bounsall, 51, walked away from Indian Springs. He was apprehended in California and faced eight more years in prison.

In April 1999, Ramon Daniels left the camp and was later re-arrested in Salt Lake City.

Nathaniel Meeks, 29, walked away from the camp in December 1996 but was apprehended about eight hours later by FBI agents. In September of that year, Gerardo Andrew, 31, an inmate of the camp, was working near Desert Inn Road and Interstate 15 when he fled.