Midfield police arrested one of four inmates who escaped a Perry County state facility last weekend after officers spotted a stolen vehicle on the Bessemer Super Highway Sunday afternoon.
Johnny Dave Harris Bush Jr., 29, was stopped in the 600 block of the Bessemer Super Highway shortly after 4:30 p.m. Sunday. Officers identified the vehicle as stolen using the department’s Flock license plate reader system. The vehicle had been reported stolen from American Deli in Selma.
Bush was wanted by the U.S. Marshals S ervice in connection with the escape of four inmates from the Perry County Correctional PREP Center in Uniontown early Saturday morning. He was taken into custody without incident and charged with receiving stolen property. He is being held at the Jefferson County Jail pending extradition to Perry County and faces additional charges in multiple counties, according to the Fourth Judicial Circuit District Attorney’s Office.
Bush was convicted in Etowah County on charges including unlawful breaking and entering a vehicle and theft of property. Alabama Department of Corrections records show he was classified at the lowest custody level and had been on work release since at least 2023.
Bush was one of four inmates who broke out of the PREP Center at approximately 1:29 a.m. Saturday.
Court records filed Monday in Perry County District Court describe a coordinated escape. The inmates staged a fake medical emergency inside the facility. One pretended to need medical attention. The group then forced its way through the center, with one of the men allegedly overpowering a correctional officer to get out.
A Selma woman, Keivona Shabrion Lewis, 29, was waiting outside in a vehicle. According to the criminal complaint, Lewis drove the four men from Uniontown to her apartment on Church Street in Selma, roughly 30 miles away, where the escapees changed clothes and hid from law enforcement.
Lewis was arrested within two hours of the escape. She has been charged in Perry County with one count of permitting or aiding an escape in the first degree and four counts of first-degree hindering prosecution. She is being held without bond.
A second escapee, Jaden Christopher Maxwell, 21, turned himself in Sunday night. He has been charged in Perry County with first-degree escape.
Two escapees remain at large: Marquavious Billingsley, 24, and Kevin Gunn, 19, both of Dallas County. Anyone with information is urged to call 911 and not to approach or attempt to apprehend them.
Court records reviewed by Watchman Media Group show the escapees were facing charges ranging from property crimes to murder.
Three of the four are not participants in the PREP Center’s reentry program. They are Dallas County Jail inmates housed at the facility under a separate arrangement because the Dallas County Jail has been closed since an EF-2 tornado struck Selma in January 2023. More than three years later, the jail still has not reopened.
Billingsley, who remains at large, pleaded guilty to felony murder in Dallas County Circuit Court on Aug. 21, 2025, in connection with a 2018 shooting death on Marie Foster Street in Selma. He was 16 at the time of the offense.
Under a plea agreement, he received 240 months, split with 60 months to serve and probation. Because he had accumulated more than 79 months of jail credit, he walked directly onto probation at sentencing.
Less than four months later, Billingsley was charged with first-degree assault after Selma police said he and several others beat a man with a gun at a Selma housing complex. The Alabama Bureau of Pardons and Paroles authorized his arrest for a probation violation. He was held without bond.
The district attorney’s office had filed a motion to revoke his probation, with a hearing scheduled for May 28 — two days before the escape. If revoked, Billingsley faced up to 15 years of suspended time on the murder sentence.
Maxwell was awaiting trial on three counts of attempted murder across two separate cases — a March 2024 shooting and a December 2024 shooting — with both cases set for jury trial on Aug. 3, 2026.
Gunn, who also remains at large, was indicted on first-degree robbery for allegedly robbing a woman at gunpoint, trafficking in stolen identities, and converting a pistol to a machine gun. His robbery trial was set for Oct. 5, 2026.
The PREP Center (Parole and Probation Reentry Education and Employment Program) opened in 2022 as a state-funded reentry facility for probationers and parolees. It is operated by the Alabama Bureau of Pardons and Paroles and offers substance abuse treatment and workforce training through J.F. Ingram State Technical College.
As of late 2024, the program reported a zero-percent recidivism rate among its 232 graduates.
However, the facility has also been housing Dallas County inmates since the 2023 tornado.
Bureau Director Cam Ward told Alabama Daily News in December 2024 that Dallas County rents space, pays for food and utilities, and provides its own staffing.
In the wake of Saturday’s escape, officials emphasized that the Dallas County inmate population is separate from the PREP program.
The day before the escape, the Dallas County Commission approved a $21 million bid for the final phase of jail reconstruction. Dallas County Sheriff Mike Granthum estimated the project would take 14 to 18 months.
Saturday’s incident is not the first security problem involving Dallas County inmates at the Uniontown facility.
In December 2025, the Times-Standard-Herald reported on an inmate, also from Dallas County, who attempted to escape and then called a woman from inside the facility while impersonating a staff member in an effort to arrange his own release.
