An inmate who took part in an audacious 2016 Orange County jail escape was convicted Wednesday of breaking out of lockup, but was acquitted of kidnapping for robbery a taxi driver as part of his getaway.
Bac Tien Duong, 48, was the first of three inmates to go to trial for his role in the daring escape from the Orange County Sheriff’s Department’s Central Jail Complex in Santa Ana and subsequent week-long manhunt.
An Orange County Superior Court jury delivered a mixed verdict, finding Duong guilty of felony escape by a prisoner in custody, but not guilty of kidnapping for robbery. The jury was scheduled to return on Thursday morning to consider lesser charges of kidnapping.
The jurors were unable to reach a consensus on a felony car theft charge, leading a judge to declare a mistrial on that count.
Duong – along with fellow inmates Hossein Nayeri and Jonathan Tieu – was accused of spending months cutting through half-inch steel bars in order to gain access to plumbing tunnels, then climbing rungs inside the tunnel to the roof and using a rope made of bed sheets to rappel five stories down the side of the building.
During Duong’s trial, Deputy District Attorney Jake Jondle told jurors that leading up to the escape Duong provided a friend with a “shopping list” of items he needed, such as climbing rope, a knife, changes of clothes, shoes and a cell phone.
Twice the friend brought duffel bags with the requested items to the outside of the jail, where the escapees lowered a rope with a hook and pulled the bags up to the roof, the prosecutor said. That same friend acted as an initial getaway driver the night of the escape, bringing the three inmates to a home in Westminster, then back to Santa Ana.
Long Ma, an unlicensed, unsuspecting independent taxi driver who advertised in local Vietnamese newspapers, picked the men up in Santa Ana and drove them to Rosemead, where one of the escapees pulled a gun on him.
The escapees held Ma against his will for several days, first in hotels around Rosemead before they allegedly stole a van in Los Angeles and drove to San Jose and San Francisco.
Duong’s attorney, Deputy Public Defender Abby Taylor, flatly admitted that Duong took part in the escape. But she denied that he was responsible for the kidnapping of the taxi driver or the theft of another man’s van.
“His dream was to get out, party, meet some girls and flee to Vietnam,” Taylor said of Duong.
Taylor described Nayeri as the mastermind behind the escape, as well as the alleged kidnapping and car theft. Duong was in fear of Nayeri, the defense attorney said, and followed his lead.
At the time of the escape, Nayeri was awaiting trial for the abduction and torture of an Orange County marijuana dispensary owner, a crime he has since been convicted of. Nayeri, who was accused of personally cutting the penis off the dispensary owner he abducted and tortured, has been described as a “psychopath” and a “truly diabolical criminal” by a prosecutor involved in his other trial.
Nayeri and Duong eventually came to blows following an argument in a Northern California motel room. Duong told the taxi driver that Nayeri wanted to kill him, according to trial testimony. Duong took Ma with him and the two traveled back to Santa Ana, where Duong turned himself over to police. Nayeri and Tieu were found a day later in San Francisco.
The prosecutor alleged that Duong was fully aware and involved in every part of the escape, denying it was “some happy accident the defendant stumbled into.”
“He knew what was happening, he knew the plan was to kidnap (Ma), he knew the plan was to take his car,” Jondle said.
At the time of the escape, Duong was being held on an attempted murder charge related to a Santa Ana shooting.
Had he been convicted of all the charges he was facing related to the jail escape, Duong would have faced up to 12 years to life in prison. Now, his prison sentence will depend on what the jury decides regarding a potential lesser kidnapping charge.
Nayeri and Tieu are still awaiting trial for their alleged roles in the escape. But Nayeri during his earlier criminal trial admitted to escaping jail, saying he felt he was being “railroaded” by law enforcement.
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