Muleshoe jail escapee sentenced to 14 months

U.S. District Judge James Wesley Hendrix on Thursday told Juan Anthony Cordero that the facts of his case outweighed the lenient punishment both his defense attorney and federal prosecutors requested.

However, the judge acknowledged Cordero's role - after his arrest - in the capture of the man he helped escape from a Muleshoe jail and reconsidered the heavier punishment he planned to dole out and sentenced Cordero to 14 months in a federal prison.

Cordero, 25, has been held at the Lubbock County Detention Center since August and faced up to five years in federal prison after pleading guilty in November to a count of assisting escape from federal custody.

He admitted to helping Mark Anthony Lucio escape from the Bailey County jail and then supplying him with a 9 mm handgun.

"What you did was so dangerous," Hendrix told Cordero.

A pre-sentencing report provided to Hendrix calculated Cordero's offense level and criminal history and determined that a prison sentence between eight to 14 months in prison was appropriate.

In what Hendrix described as a rare move, the U.S. Attorney's office recommended an eight-month sentence.

The recommendation was non-binding and Hendrix told Cordero he planned to hand down a harsher punishment, saying the facts before him showed Cordero had an active role in planning Lucio's escape.

Hendrix told Cordero that he had the opportunity to rethink his actions and withdraw from the plan, but didn't.

"That's hard to ignore," Hendrix said.

Lucio was being held at the Bailey County Jail for federal drug and weapons charges from an August 2019 arrest.

In June, Lucio pleaded guilty to those charges and faced between 10 years to life in prison.

However, court documents state on the morning of Aug. 29 Lucio crawled under the jail's sally port door and ran to an awaiting Dodge Dart driven by Cordero.

Court documents do not state how Lucio accessed the sally port, which is a controlled area used to bring inmates into the jail.

A deputy U.S. marshal found a recorded jail visit a day before the escape between Lucio and Cordero during which the two planned Lucio's escape.

"Cordero and Lucio discussed the planned time for the escape and what vehicle Cordero would be driving," a criminal complaint states.

Lucio called Cordero minutes before his escape, advising him to be ready.

The deputy U.S. marshal also caught the Dodge Dart's license plate and traced it to Cordero, who was found at a home in Plainview.

Cordero admitted to helping Lucio escape and supplying him with a 9 mm handgun. He said he dropped off Lucio in Abernathy, where he was found and arrested.

Lucio was booked into the Terry County Jail about 5:30 p.m. that day.

In court, Cordero apologized for his actions and told the court he hoped not to be away from his children for very long.