RIESEL, Texas — Law enforcement guarded over two dozen inmates on the roadside of a McLennan County highway this morning after a prison bus had mechanical failure, police said.
Robert Hurst, a spokesperson with the Texas Department of Criminal Justice said the prison transported 27 inmates and three corrections officers on Highway 6 south outside of Riesel.
Officials routed another prison bus from Gatesville around noon on Wednesday to pick up the inmates stopped on the highway, Hurst said.
Multiple law enforcement agencies including the McLennan County Sheriff's Office and Riesel P.D. were on the scene guarding inmates.
The inmates aboard the bus were traveling from Huntsville back to the Hughes unit in Gatesville, which is the same prison assigned to escaped cartel killer Gonzalo Lopez.
Adding a third corrections officer on board the bus is part of new changes coming in the wake of Lopez's escape and the brutal slayings of a grandfather and his four grandsons last month.
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State Sen. John Whitmire (D-Houston) told 25 News on June 7 that 2,000 inmates travel on the roads of Texas each day – half for medical-related reasons. The state of Texas has 98 prisons and 120,000 inmates.
