UHD chief nabs escaped car thief

Turns out it wasn't really all that hard to capture Andrew Dale Coley, the car thief who escaped from a private jail downtown on Monday evening — all it took was a police chief who happened to be in the right place at the right time. The chief was Rick Boyle, of UH-Downtown, who nabbed Coley while jogging along Buffalo Bayou on Wednesday afternoon.

It happened around 12:20 p.m. yesterday as Boyle ran along the bayou bank not far from the Harris County Jail (which, by the way, wasn't the one from which Coley escaped — more on that later). Boyle, who wasn't in uniform, noticed a man who he thought looked like Coley, so he jogged up and asked the man if he was, indeed, the escapee. Amazingly enough, Coley reportedly said that he was. Boyle identified himself as a police officer, after which Coley apparently realized he had made a pretty stupid move; Coley took off, but Boyle was able to catch him and walk him the few blocks to the county jail.

Coley was convicted of auto theft in November, according to the Chronicle, and he entered the South Texas Intermediate Sanction Facility at 1511 Preston Ave., across Crawford Street from Minute Maid Park, on May 23. Authorities believe he escaped from the facility by crawling through the ventilation system — which, like riding out in a laundry truck or using a nail file to saw through cell bars, is one of those things we've heard of many times but wouldn't expect to actually work. He is expected to be charged with escape.