Dustin Broussard’s six days on the lam ended Thursday afternoon with a single sentence: “I can’t run no more.”
Broussard, who managed to elude law enforcement officers for almost a week after escaping from the Walthall County Jail on July 16, surrendered Thursday afternoon to McComb police detective Brian Boyd, who was among numerous lawmen from various agencies taking part in an intense manhunt.
Walthall County Sheriff Duane Dillon said the capture occurred about 3:40.
Broussard is now charged with two counts of escape and one count of overpowering a corrections officer.
He is being held in the Marion-Walthall Regional Correctional Facility in Columbia, where he was transferred Thursday even-ing after his capture.
Dillon said the events leading to his capture began about 5 p.m. Wednesday, when someone saw Broussard near a nine-acre wooded area on the south side of Highway 98, just west of Tylertown.
Lawmen from several state and local departments and volunteers searched the woods from Wednesday night into early Thursday morning.
Officers resumed their search about 7 a.m. Thursday after Broussard was again seen in the area by a state trooper.
Officers and volunteers searched the woods for most of the day, aided by a U.S. Customs Service helicopter using a forward-looking infrared scanner.
Boyd said he searched the woods and then returned to his car, which was parked on an old logging road near Highway 98.
“I got in and drove around the perimeter and went back to where I was parked,” he said. “I had been there about 10 minutes when he came walking out of the woods and said he couldn’t go no more and he was cramping.”
Boyd said he drew his gun and ordered Broussard to get on the ground, and Broussard complied. As he was handcuffing Broussard, Boyd said, a Walthall County sheriff’s deputy was entering the road in his car.
“I motioned to him, and we put him in the deputy’s car,” Boyd said.
The deputy took Broussard to the Walthall County Jail, from which he escaped on July 16 during a prisoner transfer. A prisoner transportation company was taking Broussard and his wife Alysha to Walthall County from Maricopa County, Ariz., where the couple had been held awaiting extradition.
The Broussards were taken to Arizona after they were picked up by Mexican authorities on June 30 on Walthall County fugitive warrants. The couple had been hiding in Mexico after Broussard escaped April 25 while attending his grandmother’s funeral.
At the time of that escape, Dustin Broussard was awaiting a probation violation hearing for failing to appear in court on charges of DUI and arson.
When Broussard and his wife returned on July 16, he slipped away from officers after his handcuffs and shackles were removed and managed to elude officers by moving around the county until surrendering.
“We had a lot of help from different agencies during this search,” Dillon said Thursday.
“We had officers from the Pike County Sheriff’s Department, U.S. Customs, the Highway Patrol, Mississippi Bureau of Investigation, Highway Patrol Special Operations, Mississippi Bureau of Narcotics, McComb police, Tylertown police, Mississippi Department of Corrections, Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, Lawrence County Sheriff’s Department, and a lot of volunteers,” Dillon said. “They provided us with a lot of manpower that I just didn’t have.”
