NEW ORLEANS — Within hours of capturing a teenager in Texas on Monday nearly three weeks after he escaped from a juvenile halfway house in Louisiana, police arrested one of his former teachers and booked her with helping him escape.
Angela Filardo, 31, was booked with accessory to simple escape, accused of driving Lynell Reynolds, 18, from New Orleans to Texas. U.S. Marshals captured Reynolds in San Antonio Monday afternoon, and local police picked up Filardo at her home on Jackson Avenue hours later.
Reynolds’ escape sparked a manhunt across the two states. His late-night walk-away also created fear and frustration from the victim who was shot and paralyzed by the teen-ager during a robbery in 2019.
In an affidavit for Filardo’s arrest, State Police Detective Jack Uhle, Jr. described how authorities combined two forms of technology – license plate readers and pings from a cell phone used by Reynolds – to link the two and ultimately track the escapee to San Antonio.
Following the escape on Sept. 13, Uhle documented 97 “communications” between Filardo and Reynolds, eventually matching the pings from the phone to the route used by Filardo as she allegedly drove the teenager to Texas, dropping him off in Houston.
Filardo is identified in the court documents as one of Reynolds’ teachers from fifth to eighth grade. That final year in school is about the time that Reynolds, at age 13, had racked up more than a dozen felony arrests, including the attempted murder and armed robbery of Darrelle Scott, 21.
Scott, now 25 and confined to a wheelchair, said he mostly stayed indoors out of fear while his attacker was unaccounted for.
During Reynold’s nearly three weeks on the lam, he apparently traveled from the facility he escaped from in Lake Charles, La. to New Orleans, then Slidell, before getting dropped off in Texas.
While the teenager was on the run last week, New Orleans District Attorney Jason Williams issued a strong warning to anyone caught helping Reynolds.
“If they assist or aid this escapee in any way, they're committing a crime,” Williams said. “And if they have help, they need to let this office know, let the authorities know, when they were in contact with him, where he was headed next. Because anyone found to have assisted him, however slight, will be prosecuted.”
Reyolds was serving juvenile life – until age 21 – after being convicted of attempted murder and armed robbery. But based on reports from teachers and social workers, Juvenile Court Judge Candice Bates-Anderson allowed Reynolds into the “step down process” that allowed him be transferred to the non-secure facility, La Maison De Grace in Lake Charles, La.
At Filardo’s first appearance in court Tuesday, her bail was set at $5,000 with an order to wear an electronic ankle monitor if released. She faces up to six months in prison if convicted of accessory to simple escape.