Connecticut police are on the search for an inmate who may have stowed away in the undercarriage of a garbage truck or state vehicle to escape from a medium-security prison.

Jerry Mercado, 25, who was serving a three-year sentence for burglary, was last seen Sunday morning at 10:20 a.m. Correction officers at Carl Robinson Correctional Institution in Enfield, Connecticut, realized around 3:15 p.m. that he was missing and immediately followed escape protocol and locked down the prison, said Department of Correction Commissioner Scott Semple, the Hartford Courant reported.

Connecticut State Police called Mercado a “low-risk offender.” Mercado was sentenced in August 2016 for burglary in the third degree and was scheduled to be released in January 2019. Additional court records show that Mercado was also found guilty of interfering with an officer and resisting and failure to appear in court.

Prison officials said Mercado had not been experiencing any issues before his escape, the Courant reported.

He has a tattoo on the right side of his neck that reads, “Time Waits For No One.” Semple said that Mercado is believed to be in the Hartford area. Hartford is roughly 20 miles from Enfield.

This is the first reported escape from Carl Robinson Correctional Institute since 1992.

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