Two charged with helping Cofield escape from federal prison
Two people, one a former federal inmate, have been arrested and charged with helping Georgia prison con artist Arthur Lee Cofield Jr. escape from a federal prison camp earlier this year.
James David Himick and Andrea Nashay Hubbard were arrested after a federal grand jury in South Georgia issued an indictment alleging they aided and assisted Cofield when he walked away from the minimum security prison camp in Jesup on May 26.
Court records show Hubbard was arrested Oct. 13 in Atlanta. The records indicate Himick also was arrested that day but do not show where.
Cofield was sentenced to 11 years in prison in January 2024 for stealing $11 million from a Hollywood billionaire while Cofield was incarcerated in Georgia’s Special Management Unit, designed to be the state’s most secure prison. He remains a fugitive, and a report by a Savannah television station in July quoted an FBI spokesperson who said the bureau believed Cofield was in Mexico.
The indictment charging Himick and Hubbard supersedes one that charged Cofield alone shortly after his escape. The superseding indictment contains no details beyond the names of the two new defendants. Ryan Jernegan, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Southern District of Georgia, said he couldn’t provide any additional information due to the “ongoing process” of the case.
The penalty for assisting a federal prisoner’s escape includes a maximum prison sentence of five years and a fine of not more than $250,000.
The camp in Jesup, part of a large compound that also includes medium- and low-security prisons, has no perimeter fencing and is located just a short walk from a road that runs outside the complex. Cofield escaped sometime after the 5 a.m. count on May 26 and wasn’t discovered missing until the next count at 4 that afternoon.
The details are particularly notable for federal authorities because Cofield was assigned to the camp in March even though he had multiple years remaining on his sentence and had committed crimes that typically preclude prisoners from having the benefit of such a relaxed environment. Most prisoners in federal camps are short-timers who have not committed violent crimes, according to former federal prison employees who have spoken to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
In addition to pleading guilty in U.S. District Court to the $11 million theft, an elaborate scheme orchestrated with a contraband cellphone, Cofield pleaded guilty in Fulton County to ordering a drive-by shooting that left a man, shot 14 times outside an Atlanta recording studio, paralyzed from the waist down. Cofield set up the hit from inside Georgia State Prison in Reidsville because Cofield believed he and the victim were involved with the same woman.
Although the superseding indictment says little about Himick or Hubbard or how they allegedly helped Cofield escape, Himick’s background offers a possible clue to what may have transpired.
Court records show that the 43-year-old spent 10 years in federal prison on a drug conviction from Florida before being released from custody April 2 to serve the final four years of his sentence on probation.
Himick, who pleaded guilty to supplying cocaine to members of a street gang trafficking drugs in Miami, fits the profile of a federal offender who could be assigned to a camp prior to his release. However, the AJC could not determine whether he was at the camp in Jesup at the same time as Cofield because once prisoners leave federal custody, the Bureau of Prisons’ inmate locator doesn’t identify where they last were held.
On the order of Chief U.S. Magistrate Judge Justin Anand, Himick has remained in the custody of the U.S. Marshals Service since his arrest. Anand granted prosecutors’ request to detain Himick as a flight risk, citing the weight of the evidence, the ex-prisoner’s criminal history and the fact that he allegedly participated in additional criminal activity while on probation.
Himick’s attorney, Brian Mendelsohn of Atlanta, declined comment, noting that he had just been brought into the case and that it involves “a lot of moving parts.”
Hubbard is 26 and lives in Griffin, according to information on traffic tickets she has received in Georgia and Mississippi.
Federal prosecutors also sought to detain her, but Anand allowed her to be released on a $50,000 bond put up by her father, Derek Hightower, of Griffin. According to court records, Hightower used a deed to property he owns in Spalding County to secure the bond.
A Brunswick attorney appointed to represent Hubbard, George Franklin Barnhill, did not respond to phone and email messages from the AJC.
She is due to be arraigned Oct. 29. No arraignment date has been set for Himick.