NOPD continues search for escaped juvenile

Disclaimer: All persons are presumed innocent until proven guilty.

NEW ORLEANS ( WGNO ) — 17-year-old Carlos Taylor is still on the run after escaping from the Juvenile Justice Intervention Center on Sept. 23 during a detention hearing.

At a press conference, the New Orleans Police Department announced that it has deployed several specialized units, including the Violent Offender Warrant Squad, to assist in the search.

“We are confident in our ability to find wanted offenders and escapees especially,” NOPD Chief Deputy Superintendent Hans Ganthier said.

One common concern expressed was about the apparent failure to follow a new law stating that all escapes must be made public within 10 minutes of the incident.

The NOPD did not announce Taylor’s escape until about 2 hours after the incident occurred.

“It was not a disrespect or disregard of the law. It was just trying to apprehend a youth that had just got out of the facility while also trying to maintain internal order, policy and procedure and give account for all other youth in the facility,” Executive Director of the Juvenile Justice Intervention Center Dichelle Williams said.

Some residents who live near the juvenile court say that this failure is frustrating as it led to an unnecessary risk in their neighborhood.

“There should have been an alert on everybody’s phones. Everybody should have known about that. Just imagine if he had actually physically hurt somebody and we didn’t know he was out, so you know,” nearby resident Naydja CoJoe said.

Now these residents are left hoping that his next stop is back in a cell.

“Hopefully he’ll be caught and brought back to where he needs to be for whatever reason for whatever infractions that caused him to be here in the beginning,” CoJoe said.

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