Canadian prison escapee assumed dead boy’s name, hid in Sacramento for decades, feds say
Little Tommy Coy is buried under a 7-inch by 11-inch marble plaque in the historic Hicksville Cemetery near Galt, where graves date back to the 1800s and some headstones are so weathered with age they are unreadable.
Thomas Carl “Tommy” Coy was born Jan. 14, 1947, in San Joaquin County and died at 2½ in Placer County on July 12, 1949, according to the online database Find A Grave.
Then how has Thomas Carl Coy been living for decades in a three-bedroom, two-bathroom home on a quiet cul de sac in Orangevale?
He hasn’t, prosecutors say. Instead, the man living under his name stole Coy’s identity years ago and is actually Jean-Paul Halleux, a Canadian fugitive who escaped from a prison in the province of Manitoba in 1973 and disappeared for more than 40 years, court filings say.
Now, Canada wants him back, filing an extradition request in Sacramento federal court last week seeking an order that will return Halleux to finish serving out the 885 days in prison authorities north of the border say he still owes them.
Halleux, now 73 and the former owner and operator of a Sacramento truck towing and transport company, would not comment on the accusations leveled against him by prosecutors in federal and Sacramento Superior Court.
His attorney, Clyde Blackmon, also would not talk, declining to comment through an assistant.
When The Sacramento Bee visited the Halleux home Monday seeking an interview, a woman who answered the door said he was “too upset” to talk about the case and that he had decided to return to Canada. She added that she did not want to talk further, saying “it’s his story.”
His story, according to court documents from Canadian officials, begins on Nov. 1, 1969, in Tupperville, Ontario, where a passing police officer noticed that the lights in the local general store and post office were not working.
A break-in, a conviction and a prison escape
An Ontario Provincial Police officer saw a car parked in front and found Halleux inside, along with two screwdrivers, a pair of Vise-Grip pliers and a blue wool glove.
“In the vehicle, the officer found an assortment of tools and noticed that the glass window, the molding of the front door of the Post Office and General Store had been damaged and the marks on the door matched marks on one of the screwdrivers found on Mr. Halleux,” according to an affidavit from Lisa Manson, the national manager of sentence management for the federal Correctional Service of Canada.
Halleux, 24 at the time, was convicted on Jan. 6, 1970, of possession of housebreaking instruments and sentenced to four years in prison.
He was paroled after serving less than two years, winning his release from the Millhaven Institution on Nov. 24, 1971.
Within four months, Halleux was in trouble again.
On March 27, 1972, officers from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police were called to Steven’s Lumber Yard in Fannystelle, Manitoba, to investigate a break-in.
“Once at the lumber yard, police witnessed an individual dive through a window of the officer building,” court filings say. “This individual was arrested outside the building and identified himself as Jean Paul Halleux.”
Halleux was convicted two weeks later of breaking and entering and sentenced to two years in prison at the Rockwood Institution — now known as Stony Mountain Institution — a federal prison near Winnipeg that originally opened in 1877.
He didn’t last long there.
On Sept. 1, 1973, 17 months into his two-year sentence, he escaped and became a fugitive.
Living for years in Sacramento area
Court papers say he used a series of aliases after his escape, including Jack Joseph Rivard, variations on his own name and Coy.
Online records say a Social Security number attributed to “Coy” was issued in Nevada in 1977 and that he has lived in the Sacramento area since 1980 at addresses in Sacramento, North Highlands and Orangevale, where he has resided since 1996.
Records show he made his living running tow-truck companies, and a Yelp review for his service gave him positive marks for a 2013 interaction with a customer.
“Very friendly guy,” a customer wrote. “Overall I was completely satisfied and would recommend this service to anyone! I took a card of his and will be calling next time, which will be inevitable with my luck. Thanks Tom!”
That same year, however, Canadian authorities made clear they were still looking for him. A warrant of “apprehension and recommitment to custody” was issued by the Stony Mountain prison on June 19, 2013, and Canadian extradition papers note that “there is no statute of limitations in respect to the offenses for which the person sought stands charged.”
DMV caught on to fraud
Halleux remained a fugitive until September 2017, after state Department of Motor Vehicle investigators apparently noticed a problem with a vehicle title.
Felony charges filed by the Sacramento County District Attorney’s Office say Halleux, originally named as “John Doe” or Thomas Carl Coy, committed perjury on Feb. 19, 2015, when “he falsely identified himself under a dead child’s true identity” while registering a title.
He also is charged with falsely obtaining Coy’s identity “for an unlawful purpose and to obtain or attempt to obtain credit, goods, service and information in the name of Thomas Carl Coy, a deceased child, without consent.”
Halleux was arrested and in January 2018 fitted with an electronic GPS monitoring device while awaiting trial. That case has been pending ever since, with the next hearing in it set for March 11.
Despite the fact that Halleux had remained free since early 2018, federal prosecutors in Sacramento filed court papers late Tuesday seeking the fugitive’s arrest and detention without bail pending extradition proceedings.
“The court should detain Halleux without bond because he is a flight risk,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Quinn Hochhalter wrote in the filing. “Halleux previously escaped from prison and has evaded Canadian authorities for almost forty years.
“Allowance of bail in any amount would not guarantee Halleux’s presence in court and would invite the possibility of embarrassing the United States in the conduct of its foreign affairs.”
Halleux arrested Wednesday
On Wednesday, U.S. Marshals arrested Halleux, who was being booked into the Sacramento County Main Jail at 10:01 a.m. under the name of Thomas Carl Coy.
He appeared before U.S. Magistrate Judge Allison Claire for a brief hearing at 2 p.m. during which he waived extradition proceedings and agreed to be returned to Canada.
“Is what you want to do is go back to Canada to handle this matter?” Claire asked.
“Yes, it is,” said Halleux, who was wearing a brown, hooded jacket and pants rather than jailhouse garb.
Claire ordered him detained until he can be turned over to the Canadians, a process that Hochhalter said typically takes two to three weeks.
Court papers say any time he spends in detention in the United States will not be deducted from the time he owes Canada. There, officials say, he was sentenced to a total of six years and one month — 2,221 days — but served only 1,336 days before his escape.
Halleux, who lives on a cul de sac of eight homes, is considered a good neighbor who had never caused anyone problems, said Steve Goodlow, who has lived next door to him since 2000.
Goodlow, 69, knew something was going on with his neighbor when half a dozen unmarked cars showed up two years ago in the early morning hours to arrest him.
“It was a shock, a total shock,” he said of the arrest, but added that he never knew what the case was about.
“I’ve never known him in 20 years to do anything off the rails,” Goodlow said. “He was just an upstanding man and a great neighbor.”
Goodlow, when told of the case details by The Bee, said he didn’t think sending his neighbor back to Canada was necessary at this point, especially for 885 days, given his age.
And he added that his neighbor always offered to watch over his house whenever he went out of town on vacation.
“I don’t have a bad word to say about him,” Goodlow said. “He’s like a watchdog for my house.”
This story was originally published February 26, 2020 at 12:39 PM.