The Corrections Officer was sitting in the hallway, outside the inmate's hospital room, while Rocklage ate. The Corrections Officer then "hears a bang and thinks it came from the elevator down the hall," Binder said. The bang actually had something to do with Rocklage's escape. He somehow managed to get the shackles off the bed rail. Rocklage locked himself in the bathroom.
As the hospital staffers came to help the Corrections Officer unlock the bathroom door, Rocklage crawled through the ceiling of the bathroom. He dropped through ceiling tiles into a patient's room -- six rooms down the hall from where he began.
The Corrections Officer saw Rocklage run into the hall toward an exit. The Corrections Officer intercepted him, and they scuffled there. The Corrections Officer fired his Taser from point-blank range. Because it was so close, the Taser's darts didn't have time to move past the Taser's "blast door."
"The 21 feet of wire got tangled up," Binder said, "and it shocked both of them. It was all over both of them." Rocklage then tried to get the Corrections Officer's handgun.
"The corrections officer was in a fight for his life at that point," Binder said.
Rocklage never did get the Corrections Officer's handgun.
They scuffled some more, crashing through a stairwell door. Rocklage then ran out of the hospital's main entrance -- with the leg shackle still attached.
In December 2005, Rocklage was sentenced to three years in prison for two counts of possession of heroin, one count of possession of cocaine and escape from custody. About five months later, he was released from prison and put on probation. Three weeks after that, on April 26, 2006, Rocklage was sentenced to five years in prison for possession of a controlled substance. His probation was revoked and he was sent back to prison on Aug. 8, 2007. He was paroled on July 24, 2008.
Binder said he was unaware of Rocklage's conviction for escaping St. Louis police custody in 2005.
<message edited by Zarathustra on Mar 26, 2009 09:08>