A second prisoner escaped from San Quentin State Prison recently as corrections officers were still busy investigating another recent escape.
Ronnie Wayne Lee, a 31-year-old parole violator from Modesto, was on the loose after apparently running off while doing gardening work near the east gate for the minimum-security prison ranch on October 4th.
Prison spokesman Vernell Crittendon said Lee's supervisor noticed that he was gone about 11:40 a.m. as the prison crew worked in the backyards of various residences just inside the prison gate.
Crittendon said a search of the prison grounds, nearby housing and roadways turned up nothing.
Lee was the fifth prisoner to escape from the ranch since 1997. More troubling is that his disappearance comes on the heels of the Sept. 25 escape of a child molester from a medium-security area surrounded by barbed wire fences and guard towers.
Eduardo Silva Mariscal, 31, is still at large more than a week after donning gloves, throwing blankets over the razor wire on two fences and then climbing to freedom in plain site of a guard tower.
That escape infuriated corrections officials and prompted an internal investigation into prison security.
The most recent escape did not require gloves or blankets. Lee simply had to run up a hill and onto the roadway to get away, according to Crittendon, who explained that minimum-security prisoners are not placed behind bars and are trusted enough to work in residential areas.
Lee was arrested in 1995 for passing bad checks.  While out on parole in 1999, he was implicated in a burglary and skipped town. Police captured him in August and he was due for parole again in December.
Lee was described as 5-foot-9 and 180 pounds, with blond hair and mustache, and blue eyes. He has “Modesto” tattooed in large letters across his back and a swastika tattooed to his right hand.