A New Orleans jail custodian was sentenced to 2.5 years in prison Thursday for his role in enabling a mass escape that became one of the largest jailbreaks in recent U.S. History.
Sterling Williams, 34, received the sentence after pleading guilty to one count of malfeasance in office for shutting off water to a cell toilet in May 2025, a move that allowed 10 inmates to remove the fixture, crawl through a gap in the wall and scale a fence to freedom. The escapees left behind a graffiti taunt scrawled for guards to find: “To Easy LoL.”
Williams’ attorney, Michael Kennedy, maintained that his client never intentionally aided the prisoners. “He does admit that he failed to follow protocol in a job as a public employee, and that it is possible that those actions aided in a plan hatched by 10 inmates to escape,” Kennedy said. “But again, without Mr. Williams’ knowledge.”
Kennedy said Williams should have generated a work order before shutting off the water for the clogged toilet, a procedural step he skipped. The attorney acknowledged his client made mistakes but stressed there was no deliberate conspiracy between the custodian and the escapees.
An additional 2.5 years of Williams’ sentence was suspended, and he will serve three years of probation upon release. The state dropped 10 more serious charges against him of being a principal to aggravated escape, an offense that carries up to 10 years in Louisiana.
The fallout from the jailbreak has extended well beyond Williams. At least 14 other people, many of them friends and family members of the escapees, were arrested and accused of providing food, cash, transport and shelter to the fugitives.
All 10 inmates were eventually captured, though the manhunt stretched across months for one convicted murderer who remained at large for five months before being discovered hiding beneath a house in Atlanta. The recaptured inmates now face charges of aggravated escape and are scheduled for jury trial in April.
The escape has also triggered a broader reckoning over jail management. Earlier this year, a grand jury handed down a 30-count indictment against then-Orleans Parish Sheriff Susan Hutson, charging her with malfeasance, obstruction of justice and falsifying public records.
Hutson is not accused of directly helping the inmates escape. Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill said a state probe determined that Hutson’s poor management created the conditions that allowed the jailbreak to happen.
Bianka Brown, the chief financial officer of the sheriff’s office, was also indicted on 20 similar charges. Both Hutson and Brown have pleaded not guilty.
Williams’ sentencing closes one chapter of a sprawling case that exposed systemic vulnerabilities at the New Orleans jail, even as larger questions about leadership accountability remain unresolved ahead of upcoming trials.
The 10 escaped inmates are scheduled for jury trial in April on aggravated escape charges.