VERNON, Texas – A man acquitted of murder because of insanity is back in custody two weeks after he escaped from a North Texas mental hospital, police said.
Alexander Scott Ervin, 29, was located in Austin on Sunday, after he escaped on June 26 from the North Texas State Hospital in Vernon, Texas, Vernon Police Chief Randy Agan said.
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Austin is 350 miles south of Vernon. A caller to Austin 911 operators reported Ervin was suffering from heat stroke and needed medical treatment, Agan said. Once in custody, Ervin said he had gone to Austin in search of his mother.
“They say he was arrested peacefully without incident,” Agan told the Vernon Record.
Ervin was charged with stabbing his father to death in Austin in 2013. Ervin testified that he was a CIA-trained assassin killing an imposter. Once acquitted, Ervin was committed to the state hospital system.
Staff at the Vernon hospital contacted police the morning of June 27 after learning that Ervin was missing. A review of security video showed the patient scaling a security fence the night before, and he was tracked to the nearby Pease River where police speculate that he hopped a freight train.