A Holy Bible played an integral part in the escape of four prisoners from the St. Tammany Parish Jail last month, and an ex-wife of one of the escapees has been arrested.

Tuesday afternoon, St. Tammany Parish Sheriff Jack Strain told how Claudia Buras, 25, of Irvington, Ala., came to visit her ex-husband, Eric Buras June 7 and allegedly smuggled in three hacksaw blades that were used to cut through bars in a jail window allowing four prisoners to escape June 18.

The arrest of Claudia Buras is what Strain called the “last piece,” in answering how the four men escaped. Shortly after the four men were recaptured, Strain said detectives were able to link Claudia Buras to the escape plan. When detectives visited her Alabama home, they found evidence that she had taken part in the plan. She was then arrested for introducing contraband into a penal institution and one count of assisting escape.

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According to Detective Stacey Callender and Lt. Joe Piconi, Claudia came to visit Buras July 7. While in an area where prisoners usually talk to their lawyers, Claudia allegedly gave Buras a Bible with three hacksaw blades hidden inside the binding of the book.

“The binding was unglued, the blades slipped in, and then the cover was glued seamlessly back together,” Strain said.

Strain explained that usually books are not put through a metal detector, which is one reason why the blades were not discovered. Jailers did not take the book apart because there was nothing to raise suspicion. Even after Buras was strip-searched after his ex-wife’s visit, the blades were not recovered.

Piconi speculated that Buras and his three compatriots, Gary Slaydon, Jason Gainey, and Tim Murray spent the next two weeks sawing through the bars of a 17-inch wide window. Strain said the window was out of view from others in that part of the jail, which made it easy for the four to take turns sawing through the metal. Callender said that all three blades had homemade handles attached to them. She said they had been shortened to about 6-inches long and all showed a “great deal of use.” The blades are in the evidence room currently. However, Strain said they have not been able to find the Bible.

“We’ve searched high and low for it, but so far, no luck,” the sheriff said.

Strain said that after Claudia Buras was arrested she confessed to her part in the scheme, and also told detectives this was the second attempt to free her ex-husband.

Strain would not go into details about the first attempt, explaining it would only be “guessing.”

He did say that steps have been taken to make sure “this never happens again.” He would not go into details, but did say the metal detectors would be used more often, and all books entering the jail will be inspected.

“We want to make sure anybody who tries this will be foiled,” Strain said. “This is an ongoing effort to keep one step ahead.”

Claudia Buras was in jail with a $100,000 bond. However, Strain said her father paid the bond in full with a cashier’s check Monday night and she is out of jail. Piconi and Callender said Buras is not a flight risk.

“We know how and where to get her. That is not a problem,” Piconi said.

Strain doesn’t think that Claudia Buras realizes the seriousness of what she did.

“The cost and manpower in finding those four prisoners was big,” Strain said. “What she did was very serious.”

Buras, Gainey and Murray were all awaiting trails for first and second-degree murders. Slaydon had been convicted of attempted second-degree murder and was waiting to be transferred to another facility when the four made their escape. In what Strain called the largest manhunt in parish history, Buras, Gainey and Slaydon were recaptured several hours after the escape, near the jail. It took police 48 hours to find Murray.

He was found by K-9 units hiding in a woodpile near Folsom.