Escaped Inmate Killed by His Own Hostages

An escaped inmate accused of raping and murdering a woman last year was shot and killed in Mississippi on Thursday by the very people he had taken prisoner. Officials say Rafael McCloud, 34—who escaped from a Warren County jail on March 2 with a worker's uniform—was killed by the couple he was holding hostage in a Vicksburg home. Police chief Walter Armstrong tells CBS News that McCloud entered the home through a garage door around 4am Thursday and fought a man and woman who were home with their 5-year-old son. The man was stabbed in the shoulder and his wife was hit in the head before both were tied up in a bathroom, reports the Vicksburg Post. Around 7am, however, the woman either was allowed to leave the room or she freed herself, but either way, she returned with a gun.

Police say she fired one shot she thought hit McCloud, then untied her husband, who fired several more shots. The family then flagged down a passing motorist who called 911. Police found McCloud dead in the tub with multiple bullet wounds. "This community has really been frightened for over a week, and that has come to an end," Armstrong says, calling the couple's treatment "torture." McCloud, who was indicted in January, escaped from jail after cornering a jail worker with a shank and walked out with a uniform, keys, and radio. A day later, police found the uniform pants at the abandoned hospital where he allegedly killed Sharon Wilson, 69. Cops are now investigating if McCloud had help on the run. "He had on a nice white pair of tennis shoes, and he had jeans on that he didn't have when he left jail," Armstrong says. "The shoes looked to be the exact size he wears." (More Mississippi stories.)