Police launched a multistate manhunt after a prisoner made a daring escape from a maximum-security federal detention center in Rhode Island on New Year’s Eve, scaling a building, climbing over razor-wire fences, and stealing a getaway vehicle just across the Massachusetts border.
James W. Morales, 35, who was being held on charges that he broke into a Worcester armory and stole a cache of firearms in November 2015, was discovered missing from the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility in Central Falls, R.I., at 11:30 p.m. Saturday.
US Marshal Jamie Hainsworth said Morales was probably bleeding from injuries he suffered while climbing at least two sections of razor wire.
After the escape, Massachusetts State Trooper Tim Blackwell and a police dog, Klass, tracked Morales’s trail to an area under an Interstate 95 overpass in Massachusetts near the Rhode Island line, where police found what appeared to be discarded prison clothing with blood on it.
Police said the trail ended abruptly there, suggesting he continued his flight by car.
State Police said they believe Morales stole the car, a green Chevy Lumina, from the parking lot of a nearby tobacco shop, BK Mart, on Route 1 in Attleboro. The Lumina was found Sunday afternoon, according to State Police, but they did not say where.
Prior to his incarceration, Morales lived in Cambridge, but he also has ties to the Framingham area, as well as New York.
Morales, a former Army reservist, was arraigned in US District Court in Islip, N.Y., in November 2015 on charges he broke into Lincoln W. Stoddard Army Reserve Center in Worcester and stole 10 Sig Sauer 9mm pistols and six M-4 combat rifles.
An FBI affidavit claimed he slipped into the facility and penetrated the vault of weapons by shattering a kitchen window, climbing to the top of a weapons vault, and cutting a hole through layers of metal and wood.
The break-in was particularly bold because Morales was wearing a GPS monitoring device after he was charged in Middlesex County with sexually assaulting a child. Authorities said they used both DNA from bloodstains and data from the monitoring bracelet to place him at the scene.
He later cut the bracelet off, authorities alleged.
The Middlesex County charges came in 2015 after Morales was accused of sexually touching a friend’s child during an overnight visit to the home of his friend’s mother. Morales pleaded not guilty to charges related to that episode, but he failed to show up for a court appearance in Woburn.
Police asked anyone who spots Morales or has information on his location to immediately call 911.
Officials described him as a 6-foot-1-inch, 175-pound African-American with brown eyes and black hair. He has a large eagle tattoo on the left side of his neck and was bald at the time of his escape last night.
“He’s considered dangerous,’’ Wrentham police said. “If seen, do not approach. Call 911.’’
This is not the first time someone has escaped from Wyatt Detention Facility, which was founded in 1993. Four men fled the jail in 1996 after cutting through a chain-link fence adjacent to an outdoor recreation yard. They then climbed to the roof, and jumped over a razor-wire fence.
But the facility has since been overhauled and expanded. A $47 million project in 2006 more than doubled its maximum capacity to 770 detainees, up from 300.
In its 2015 annual report, the facility said it was “recognized as one of the most secure adult detention facilities in the United States.’’ Prison administrators did not return calls seeking comment Sunday.
But the US Marshals Service vowed to recapture Morales, noting that multiple police agencies in Rhode Island and Massachusetts were involved in the search.
“The United States Marshals Service has a long successful history of finding fugitives and escapees,’’ Hainesworth said, adding “this force is multiplied by our fugitive task force officers from the Local and State Police from both Rhode Island and Massachusetts.’’
“Everything that can be done is being done,’’ he said.
Todd Wallack can be reached at twallack@globe.com.
