Archive

Clerical Error Leads to Criminal Release

OOPSY DAISY

Murder suspect still at large after walking out of jail.

cheats/2013/05/04/clerical-error-leads-to-criminal-release/130504-clerical-error-release-cheat_xvkxgn
Johnny Mata. (Los Angeles County Sherrif's Department/AP)

This must be pretty high on the list of history's most unfortunate clerical errors. Los Angeles officials revealed Friday that Johnny Mata, charged for murder in a 2010 gang shooting, was mistakenly released from jail last month due to bureaucratic oversight. Even worse, the department waited until this week to announce the issue, apparently because it wanted to exhaust all possible leads first. The error allegedly occurred when a processing clerk forgot to enter a "hold" in Mata's file in the computer system. He is still at large.

Read it at Los Angeles Times

Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here.