Man escapes from Reality House

By Harry Plumer

Published March 14, 2008

A Boone County Sheriff’s Department deputy apprehended a man who might have been attempting to escape from Reality House Programs Inc., near Prathersville Road, Thursday at approximately 8 a.m., according to the department.

A deputy on patrol spotted Nicholas S. Bono, 24, running through a field next to Reality House. The deputy made contact with Bono because he repeatedly looked back over his shoulder at Reality House while running, according to a news release from the sheriff’s department.

“It is suspicious to see someone running away from Reality House,” said Maj. Tom Reddin, who works in the department.

Reality House is a nonprofit community-based agency in Columbia that partners with the Missouri Department of Corrections to provide services that facilitate a prison inmate’s re-entry into society.

“It is sort of a halfway house for parolees, and it also can serve as an overflow area for some of (Boone County Jail’s) low-risk inmates,” Reddin said.

Bono was at the Reality House as part of a conditional-release program that began Jan. 24.

“Conditional release means that we kept this person in jail as long as we could,” Missouri Department of Corrections spokesman Brian Hauswirth said.

What might have been Bono’s escape attempt was likely caused by a warrant issued by the Missouri Department of Corrections on Wednesday for a violation of his conditional release. This would have sent him back to jail indefinitely.

“We issued a warrant at 2:45 p.m. on Wednesday because he made himself unavailable for supervision under his conditional release,” Hauswirth said. “He could have found out from a friend or something that we were looking for him.”

Once the deputy began questioning him Thursday morning, the department described Bono as evasive and sarcastic.

When the deputy asked Bono his name, he said it was “Dickhead,” Reddin said.

The deputy informed Bono that he was going to detain him for further questioning but did not handcuff him.

At that point, Bono attempted to throw a punch at the deputy, forcing the deputy to physically detain him. Bono was able to wrestle free and began running away.

Reddin described the chase as a “brief foot pursuit of about 50 feet” before the deputy tackled Bono, who continued to resist until he was threatened with a taser.

“Once the officer aimed the taser at him, he stopped resisting immediately,” Reddin said.

Bono was taken to Fulton Reception-Diagnostic Center in Fulton, where a parole officer will interview him in the next few days.

“The parole officer will then submit a report to a board, who will then decide what to do,” Hauswirth said.

Bono was under conditional release for a March 20, 2006, guilty plea to second-degree assault in Cole County. He was sentenced to two years in prison.

That conviction also violated five years of probation Bono had been sentenced to following a July 7, 2005 guilty plea to receiving stolen property with a value greater than $500.

Prior to those convictions, Bono had been incarcerated four separate times in Callaway and St. Louis counties and the city of St. Louis. His previous sentences ranged from one day to one year.

His conditional release was set to expire in January 2009.