Former police chief who escaped the Arkansas prison as he purges a sentence for murder taken up: authorities

Former Arkansas police chief who escaped the prison when he was serving a 30 -year sentence for murder and rape was resumed after almost two weeks on the run, the authorities announced.

Grant Hardin was captured by law enforcement officials on Friday afternoon, about 1.5 mile west of northern Arkansas prison which he had escaped, according to the Sheriff’s Bureau of the County of Izard. His identity was confirmed by the analysis of fingerprints, said the sheriff’s office.

Hardin, 56, escaped the Calico Rock North Central unit in the county of Izard on May 25 after having put on a uniform and usurped the identity of a correctional services agent and having been authorized to cross a port of Sally pulling a cart.

The agents of the Application of Arkansas laws and the American border patrol located Hardin near Moccasin Creek in the county of Izard and it was placed in police custody shortly after 15 hours, according to the department of Correctional Services of Arkansas.

“The follow -up dogs were able to take a perfume in the region, and Hardin was apprehended shortly after,” the department said in a press release.

Arkansas Correctional Services Secretary Lindsay Wallace thanked those who helped “do this research to a peaceful conclusion”.

Hardin, the former Gateway police chief, Arkansas, pleaded guilty in October 2017 for first degree murder in the death of James Appleton, 59, according to the Associated Press.

He was also found guilty of the rape in 1997 of a primary school teacher in Rogers, Arkansas, a crime highlighted in the television documentary in 2023 “Devil in the Ozarks”.

During the search, officials deployed helicopters, drones and K9 officers. A tactical unit of the American border patrol in Texas, known as BORTAC, had also been deployed in Arkansas to help in human hunting, officials said.

Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders expressed his gratitude for local, state and federal police – and particularly thanked the Trump administration for having sent a border patrol team “who helped follow and apprehend Hardin”.

“Thanks to the great work of local, state and federal police forces, Arkansans can push a repair and I can confirm that violent criminal Hardin is back,” she said in a statement.

The FBI and the American marshals offered a combined reward of $ 25,000 for information leading to his capture.

Arkansas officials urged residents of the surrounding Izard county to remain vigilant and lock the doors of their homes and vehicles after his escape.

“I am very afraid that this guy will hurt or kill someone before it is finished,” said the Sheriff of Stone Brandon Long to ABC News in the middle of manhunt.

Nathan Smith, the former County prosecutor of Benton who helped put Hardin behind bars, told Arkansas Abc Affilié Khbs The prisoner escaped is “a sociopath”.