Lazaro Aleman
ECB Publishing, Inc.
An effort is underway to name a five-mile stretch of I-10 after the late Rita Jane Hall, a longtime law-enforcement officer who lived in Jefferson County and served as a Monticello police officer for a short time.
Sheriff Mac McNeill presented the highway-naming proposal to the Jefferson
County Commission on Thursday evening, Nov. 18, in the form of a resolution.
The resolution, which the Jefferson County Commission approved unanimously, asks the Florida Legislature to designate the section of I-10 between mile-markers 222 and 228 as the Senior Inspector Rita Jane Hall Memorial Highway. The stretch of highway to be named extends just east and west of the U.S. 19 exit, which is mile marker 225.
McNeill told the board that he had developed the language for the resolution based on his conversations with the late officer’s family members.
The 59-year-old Hall was killed in a traffic accident in Leon County on Dec. 27, 2018, 
when a vehicle that was traveling in the opposite direction crossed the centerline and collided with her vehicle. Medics pronounced Hall dead on the scene.
A resident of Jefferson County from 2004 until her unexpected death, Hall served in the Monticello Police Department (MPD) from 1997 to 2000, after having served some seven years in the Tallahassee Police Department.
Following her stint with the MPD, Hall went to work in the Office of the Inspector General with the Florida Department of Corrections (FDOC), where she was a senior inspector.
Hall is described as passionate and “relentless in her pursuit of fugitives from the law” in the FDOC’s Cold Case Fugitive Unit, where she held the position of Fugitive Unit Coordinator.
“She is still unsurpassed in her success in apprehending criminals who had escaped custody,” the resolution reads.
Among her many successful investigations, Hall is credited with the captures of a Florida prison inmate who had escaped prison 30 years earlier and been living under an assumed identity in Nevada, and a murderer who had eluded authorities for 32 years and been living in a remote cabin in the woods of Colorado.
Hall is also credited with coordinating numerous agencies during a 12-day campaign that she helped develop and that the resolution describes as “an ingenious undertaking to capture Florida’s oldest and most violent prison escapees.” Dubbed “The 12 Days of Fugitives,” the campaign utilized online photo galleries, newspapers and billboards to feature the wanted individuals.
Due to the publicity that the campaign generated, as well as the reward money offered by various law-enforcement agencies, the campaign resulted in the arrest of a fugitive who had been on the lam for 30 years and living under an assumed name in Missouri.
Hall is also credited with tracking down a murderer who had fled to Central America to escape punishment. Through her investigation, Hall discovered that the fugitive himself had been murdered and buried in his own yard by a fellow felon on the run.
For her tenacity in the latter case, Hall was recognized and featured on “I Almost Got Away With It,” a syndicated television show that focused on criminals’ unsuccessful efforts and ploys to avoid doing prison time.
Also an instructor at the Institute of Police Technology, Hall’s areas of expertise included Driving While Intoxicated (DWI), homicide investigations, and interviewing and interrogating techniques. She was furthermore certified as a field-training officer who helped trainees develop the skills necessary to their success as law-enforcement officers.
If that wasn’t enough, Hall also was a trained volunteer at Refuge House, where she counseled those affected by domestic and sexual violence; was an administrator for a Florida Department of Juvenile Justice grant that aimed at reducing juvenile crime in Monticello; and was an integral part of the FDOC’s Emergency Action Center, which coordinates emergency responses for all Florida correctional facilities.
In the course of her duties, according to the resolution, Hall “favorably represented the State of Florida with INTERPOL, the Australian Federal Police, and multiple other entities within the United States.”