By Everton Bailey Jr.
The Oregonian
PORTLAND, Ore. — A hand sanitizer-fueled joyride on a sheriff’s office ATV last month earned two Deschutes County inmates longer stays behind bars.
Christopher G. Turre, 30, received a three month jail sentence Monday for unauthorized use of a vehicle and second-degree escape. Shawn D. McCallister, 34, was sentenced last Wednesday to two years and a month in prison for driving under the influence of intoxicants, second-degree escape and unauthorized use of a motor vehicle, according to Oregon court records.
A judge ordered McCallister’s driver’s license be suspended for the rest of his life.
Turre and McCallister were part of a four-inmate work crew at the Rickard Road Animal Ranch east of Bend on Nov. 14 tasked with feeding rescue animals and cleaning up the property, the sheriff’s office said. The agency houses animals that have been abandoned or seized on the property.
At some point, Turner and McCallister drank hand sanitizer from a container left in the jail van, the sheriff’s office said. It’s not clear how much they drank.
The amount of alcohol in hand sanitizer ranges from 45 percent to 95 percent, according to the American Association of Poison Control Centers. Wine has 10 percent to 15 percent alcohol, and beer contains 5 to 10 percent.
Most hand-sanitizing products have more than 60 percent ethyl alcohol, which is found in beer, brandy and whiskey.
Deputy Terry Abeyta, who was in charge of overseeing the four inmates, reported that Turre and McCallister told him they were going to work at a chicken coop on the opposite side of the ranch, according to a motion to revoke Turre’s probation. The ATV was parked behind the building.
Abeyta said he later saw both men riding down a driveway on the four-wheeler, but didn’t know anything was amiss because he thought they were going to the other part of the ranch, the court documents said. It’s not clear why that didn’t trigger alarm, because he also reported neither inmate had permission or were instructed to use the ATV.
It wasn’t until Abeyta heard on his radio that there were two men speeding on a Sheriff’s Office ATV that he realized something was wrong, according to the motion. The sheriff’s office said someone had called 911 and reported seeing the men speeding on the ATV and riding in circles.
Abeyta then saw a ranch entrance gate had been forced open.
An Oregon State Police plane was deployed to help look for the men and the ATV. They crashed into a large lava field near Oregon 97 and ran away, the motion said. Turre was found on national forest land, and McCallister was tracked down in the area about 35 minutes later.
They were off the ranch property for at least an hour, the sheriff’s office said. The duo caused roughly $1,000 in damages to the gate they rammed through, according to the motion.
The men were both in the Deschutes County jail at the time due to previous driving-related convictions, court records show.
Turre was sentenced in September to 100 days in jail for driving under the influence of intoxicants and fourth-degree assault. His driver’s license was also suspended for life in that case.
McCallister was in the midst of serving a 90-day jail sentence after being convicted in August of first-degree theft, heroin possession, reckless endangering and driving while suspended.
A judge at the time ordered McCallister’s driver’s license be suspended for 90 days.