MARYSVILLE — The Marysville Police Department has started an internal investigation in the wake of an inmate of the Marysville City Jail escaping custody for two days before anyone noticed his absence.

Marysville’s Rhyan Vasquez, 19, was booked into the city jail on misdemeanor warrants from the Marysville Municipal Court Sept. 16, and was set to be transferred to the Snohomish County Jail, to be booked for investigation of first-degree robbery. When Vasquez’s attorney visited the city jail Sept. 24, jail staff finally noticed Vasquez was missing.

Marysville Police Cmdr. Wendy Wade reported that Vasquez had been transported, along with eight other city jail inmates, both to and from a Bible study class in a visitation area Sept. 22. She confirmed that Vasquez slipped out of the Marysville Public Safety Building, away from the rest of the group, during their return from the Bible study class.

“We didn’t notice him slipping out, and that’s huge,” Wade said. “We’re conducting a complete review of police procedures to find out what happened and how it happened. In twenty-five years, this has never happened at our jail, and we will make sure it never happens again.”

Although Vasquez is back in custody, with $50,000 for his escape added to his $200,000 bail for suspicion of robbery, the internal investigation at the city jail and police department has just begun. Wade declined to speculate on how long the investigation could take.

“There’s a lot of moving pieces and witnesses to sort through, so we don’t want to rush things,” Wade said. “We want to be thorough on this. We take the security of our jail very seriously, and this was a serious breach of that security. We’re taking responsibility for that.”