Man charged with shooting outside Natchez restaurant attempts jailbreak
Published 4:02 pm Monday, December 18, 2023
- Jamal Watson (Photo courtesy of Natchez Police Department)
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VIDALIA, La. — On Sunday, A Natchez man accused of shooting at tourists outside La Fiesta restaurant in Natchez in April tried to escape jail in Concordia Parish, authorities said.
Jamal Watson, 26, was rebooked at Concordia Parish Sheriff’s Office on Sunday on a simple escape charge without bond. Authorities immediately caught him when he’d climbed over a fence at Concordia Parish Correctional Facility.
Brandy Spears, Public Information Director at CPSO, said Watson was “still inside another fence and was apprehended on the CPCF grounds.”
This is Watson’s second reported escape attempt since he was initially arrested on April 7 for the shooting incident. Thirteen gunshots were fired into a recreational vehicle with four occupants outside the Mexican restaurant on John R. Junkin Drive.
The people inside the RV were from out of town, had been eating at the restaurant and were about to leave when a man, thought to be Watson, rode up to the vehicle on a bicycle and started randomly firing gunshots, police said at the time.
In July, it took three Adams County jailers to corral Watson when he refused to go back into his cell after he’d been let out to take a shower, the Natchez Democrat reported.
“A struggle ensued between the officer and the inmate, and two other guards came in to try to assist with the matter,” Adams County Sheriff Travis Patten said at the time. “During the process, the inmate was able to get one of the officer’s tasers.”
The three officers had to use a taser to subdue Watson. One of the offers sustained an elbow injury during the incident and the other two were not injured, the sheriff said.
The county has since been contracting with Concordia Parish to house inmates at its facilities following a security breach at the dated Adams County Jail.
Watson is being held on a $2,101,250 bond charged with four counts of attempted murder with extreme indifference to human life as well as with shooting into a vehicle and shooting inside of city limits.