In this episode Steve and Ken interview retired Lieutenant Charles Garnder of the New York State Department of Corrections. Charles talks about his career as a corrections officer and gives a detailed account of the now infamous Dannemora prison break.
Charles A. Gardner spent twenty-five years in the corrections profession in Northern New York, and began his training at Clinton Correctional Facility – also known as Dannemora. He trained other corrections officers and watching the slow transformation of the prison system. His acclaimed book DANNEMORA: Two Escaped Killers, Three Weeks of Terror, and the Largest Manhunt Ever in Upstate New York (PB / March 2020) is a study of the now-infamous prison break (recently dramatically realized in the series Dannemora) which he illustrates in his hit book.
Link to his book
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this is things police seefirsthand accounts with your host stevegoldladies and gentlemen welcome to thepodcast with me as alwaysken roy ball ken how are youi like the way you pronounced my namebecause it’s properyou know i’m i’m still upset at myselffor not pronouncing it correctly for solongwell at least you didn’t call me rubblei had used to have somebody call merubblelike barney rubble from the flintstonesbonnie rubbleoh you know but it’s okay i getthe name somehow throws people off idon’t knowit’s a big name it’s not like an unknownname that name is like there’s aroybal building in downtown los angelesit’s uh itit is los angeles royalty it’s yourbuildingi own it i collect rent uh it isi i am yeah well sir umtoday we have on charles gardner he was25 years in the correction systemin uh in upstate new yorkand he retired a judge and thereally cool thing is he wrote a bookabout dannemorathat um that famous now famous infamousprison break that happened in 2015.yeah um they did uh you know a showtimeseries on it and umi hear his book is really good it’sgetting great reviews and uh it’s calleddana moratwo escape killers three weeks of terrorand the largest manhunt ever in upstatenew york so uh i want to try to getsome prison stories out of them somethat prison loveand then that might not be a term[Music]you know there’s that old there’s thatold story uh uh morning sex is greatunless you’re in prison right yeahuh so look at stories you could youcould not pay meto to be a prison guard correctionsofficer that’s justthat that’s not my thing man yeah i wantto ask him about that because umyou know people growing up they say theywant to be firefighters they want to becopsno one really says they want to be aprison guard buti i think some people get into it to useit as a stepping stone to being a copand they end up staying because theylike it i think that’s the kind ofthat’s my take on it anywaysthat’s interesting i just i think thatthere’s not i think there should betwo prison guards for every inmatethat’s a lot of guards that’s the onlyway you can keepyou know there’s i don’t understand howthey keep even civility in there it’sjust crazy but itit’s a whole it’s like a different it’slike a littleeach prison is a little north korea it’sits ownyeah it’s definitely it’s definitely uhacquiredan acquired taste but i do know guysthat love it i knowi know guys going to the sheriffs in l.acounty and then they end up neverleaving the prisonthey never hit the road oh i did abackground on two prison guards fromcalifornia californiacorrections officers and both got hiredby lapdand uh yeah i don’t know i i’m sure iremember iasked them why they wanted to leave ican’t remember but it’s a you know it’sa totally differentuh totally different gig than streetpolice work souh depends but yeah a lot of people iknow i know two people who spentwho spent 30 years there and retired andthey’re they’re great but that’s whatthey wanted to doyeah really it’s very interesting we didwe had a former guest onuh one of the first guests we had on umwas a started as prison guard and thenwent into umprobation and became like a probationagentum oh cool yeah that was a i forgetwhich episode number that was butanywho uh i want to ask him about that iwant prison storiesum i want to hear about his take ondannemora and uhi want to hear about being a judge howdo you do how do you swing 25 years incorrections into being a judge that’spretty awesomejudge and isn’t he a professor as wellis he a professor i can’t remember ithink you’re rightwe’ll ask him because he’ll probablyknow everything about himhe’ll know what he did i think you knowwhat’s trippy this nameof this prison denmara just sounds likeit should bea dicaprio movie you know yeahdead or very scaryi’m scared very very spooky okay here wegoi’m gonna dial them in elementshello charles gardner welcome to thingsplease see thank you for coming onyou’re on with steveand ken hello hello hi guys how are youwe’re doing good doing fantastic sir uhwe’re excited to have you you’re umi think i think you’re only the secondcorrections guy that we’ve had on beforewe had on uhcorrections guy on uh back the verystart of the podcast but umyou’re the second and i see here youended up a judge which iswhich is pretty great yeah thank youyeah ium finished up my career 25 years andthen iran for a position of a municipal judgehere in our little tiny town and waselected anddid that for a term and then my book wascoming out and we knew that was going tobea bit of a conflict so i did not run forthe second termoh i got just one of the electedpositions that’s cooli used to work with a guy from new yorkthat um he said that they he worked in atown where they had thethe courtroom was like attached to thepolice department so you literally thenext morning you could walk the prisoneroutright in the court yeah that would havebeen niceour our county they wake you up at 2 a.m3 a.m2 in the afternoon whenever theindividual is ready to bearraigned is when you get that phonecall gotcha heyum charles i don’t want you to think i’mrude but we do thei can see you on um on the skype phoneokay we just do audio so that’s why mymy video is not on right now and you’renot seeing me i don’t want you to thinki wasall right um i’m gonna turn my i’m gonnaturn my video on thenbecause because charles has his onsure with my new camerame hanging man we just do it to ummaximize bandwidth that’s all just forthe um audioso charles you’re welcomei’m all new to this so to me[Laughter]i understand so you did 25 years incorrections and ken and i were chattingbefore we umbefore we dialed you in and um how didyou get into corrections i’m curiousbecause there’s you know we were sayinghow it’s uma lot of times people want to be youwant to be a firefighter you want to bea cop but not a lot of people say like iwant to be a prison guard you know whati meanso what was your what was your path intothatwell um i kind of had hitum all three of those um i was a villagepolice officerback in the uh the 80s umand loved it loved every second of itand my family owned a smallmap business up here in northern newyork and my father was involved in aaccident long story short i went back tothe family business and walked away fromthat uh that careerum then uhthe you know the family business iwalked away from it umi i i was just lost i lovedworking as a police officer i absolutelyloved the industryum an opportunity came along that i wasable to sellthe business which was my father’sbusiness after he had passedand i went with that opportunity and iwent intowith the department of correctionsgetting back into the law enforcementfieldgot it all right and this was in umupstate new york rightthat is correct that is correct that’sthat’s where i was from unfortunatelyuh with new york state department ofcorrections the way it works is once youbecome a member of the uhof the organization and you go throughthe training academy you go to whereverthethe voids are and back in the late 80swhen igot into the new york state departmentof corrections the uhthe need for the manpower the void wasdown inwestchester county down probably a dozenmiles from new york cityuh basically an eight-hour drive fromhomei’m a northern new york ma i live upinto the adirondackthe foothills of the adirondackmountains so for me it wasquite a task just getting down thereeight hours away and and that’s whereyou were working every weekfor for quite a while wow yeahum before we get into your umanalysis of dana moore prison break inyour book uh i’d love to hearum any stories you might have from theprisons do you have umdo you have a call like a firstexperience you had a first like intenseor um you know um adrenaline droppingexperience in the prisonswell you always hope to go through yourentire career withoutever having that out hell moment rightumi went through a few of them needless tosaymy career i started as a correctionalofficeri promoted up to a sergeant years lateri promoted to a lieutenant and then iwasappointed by the albany training academyas a regional training lieutenant whooversaw training of approximately 6 000membersin the northern 13 facilities of thestate butas an officer i had experienceda massive disturbance in one of ouryardswhereas we had approximately 300 plusinmates and only eight staff membersand the reason why we had so many staffmembers aseight with over 300 inmates was becausethe facility knew that there was goingto be potential for a problemand they’d put extra staff in the areaand so when you kind of put that alltogetherwith extra staff being eight peopleyeah with over 300 inmates and andto watch it unravel unfold and it wasquite an experienceuh without a doubt um needless to saydidn’t get home for a couple of daysafterwards facility was on lockdownwe had quite a mess to clear up andclean uphoping that that would be the only timei would experience such a thingbut lo and behold as a lieutenant as awatch commander great meadowa great metal was a maximum securityfacility that i workedlater on in my career as again as alieutenantand again a major disturbance in theyardwhere they had dropped gas and we againwe had anumber of inmates in the yard and againit was it was anentire evening before we got the yardcleared out and the facilityum realistically back into a normaloperationso can go through your whole career andnever have an incident and ihad kind of two little scrubs that uhmakes you appreciate those quieter dayswithout a doubtyes steve and i were talking about thisbefore you came onand we were we were discussing howwith a small kind of seems like a smallstaff of corrections officerskeep this large group of prisonersconvicted felonsin line how do you even do thatwell you know a little respect goes along waysin the in the industry umwhen you look at any correctionalfacility andwe can utilize uh denmark as a perfectexampleum i had only worked a couple of weeksinclinton correctional or denmark which iswhere our story evolvesand that was at the very beginning of mycareerand you have basically 3 000 inmatesat that facility and you haveapproximately 1 000 uniformedcorrectionalofficers and that’s including yoursupervising staff which is yoursergeants your lieutenants your captainsas well as your depthat are all in uniform you take thatthousanduniform staff and you divide themamongst three chefsand then you take out for training andtake out for sick time take out for daysoff and take out for other incidentalsandyou come down to just a few hundredmonitoring and watchingthree thousand convicted felons umit’s a hell of a balancing act umcorrections is always looking for betterratios than what we havethan what the state allows usyou utilize any and all tools that youhave you utilize your gatesyou utilize the common sense approach ofyour staffum and you just hope for a lot of gooddays in a rowbut at any given moment the numbers arethereit doesn’t it isn’t nuclear science hereat any day it can go south on youbut i find that a respectgoes a long ways um common senseprevails but every once in a whileit just the you know what it hits thefan pure and simplesure so i’m guessing like in thissituation you’re everybody’s not out atthe same timedifferent pods are locked down and buteven when there is a couple hundredprisoners and only one or two guardsthey kind ofthey know it’s feudal like they knowwhat’s going to happen if we have anuprisingthey’re gonna even if we take these twoguards out they’re gonna lock us downthis the guys in the turtle suits aregonna come in they’re gonna kick our assand ultimately it will be all for naughtright that’s kind of the psychologythey’re probablygoing through without a doubt yeah umand in corrections as a staff memberand as a member of the cert team thecorrections emergency response team iwas a supervisor with that for a fewyearsum during my career ultimatelythe inmates do understand that there’salways going to be a day of reckoningum understand we have to follow theletter of lawand we have to you know conductourselves accordingly becausethere’s always retribution for stupidityum but it’swe’re not going to lose one way or theotherwe’re not going to lose the battle wemight lose a couple of uhthese little wars but when it’s all saidand done we’re not going to lose thebattlepure and simple and that’s the mentalitythat you had to go to work withat the end of the day we’re going to winone way or the other i think you got thetitle for your next book day ofreckoning that’d be great[Laughter]stories of prison guards kicking ass orwe’re not gonna lose i like thatwell there’s probably a few of them outthere and justalso now i’m old school and i’m assumingyou must be as wellum because i call them prison guards aswellbut the the young lads that are outthere now they’re they’re offended byprison guards guards arethe school crossing people or the guysthat are working security at walmarttypeof thing they refer the correctionofficer titleum but please understand steve and keni’m not offended i’m an old schoolprison guardno yeah for me it’s kind of a badge ofhonorsit’s classic man yeah we’re gonna have alittle bit of feedback from a few ofthose younger lads that uhdon’t appreciate it but you’re fine withme just so that we understand each otherit’s like the it’s like the green mileyou know it takes you back you know tothe old school waysgoodness yes yes and like i said when istarted my careermy very first two weeks on the job onthe job trainingwas that clinton correctional boy andthose old-timeprison guards i mean you didn’t youdidn’t walk into those blocks you didn’tjustsit yourself down in somebody’s chairyou looked around and you got permissionbefore you sat in a chair becausechances are that chair belonged to theone or two manyou know the guy that ran the blockerthe guy that was uh secondin charge of that block so the days ofjust kind of wandering on in there andplopping yourself in a chairthat didn’t happen there was a lot ofrespect for the old schoolthe old prison guards mm-hmm yeah thoseguys are i mean thati mean in a lot of ways when you’re whenyou’re a umcorrectional officer forgive medon’t do it it doesn’t even feel rightto me it wasa prison guard is to um cop you knowwhat i mean police officer copguard correctional officer sure but nothey i totally get it and they shouldgetthey should get lots of respect for whatthey do and especially if they work foramunicipality or the state but umto me it’s like to do that job you gotto be tough as nailsand also you’re you’re locked down justlike the prisoners i mean you’re goingto workbut uh you know you’re not on your cellphone you’re not umyou know you don’t have the you’relocked inside you don’t have the freedomthat everybody else does when they’reworking you knowabsolutely you’re doing time and alsounderstand when you look at your policeofficers the police officers are outthey’re in the public not necessarilyeveryone that they’re dealing withis a criminal not necessarily everyonethat they’re dealing with is a convictedfelonnot necessarily everyone that they’redealing with has an agenda umof harm but when you’re a prison guardcorrection officer when you’re a prisonguard every single person you’re dealingwith all day longis a convicted felon yeah every singleone of them has an agenda ofmanipulation or see what’s in it forthemthere’s a scam of some way shape or formthat’s brewing every secondum um they’re not societiesnice people these are people that areincarcerated for a reasonum so when law enforcement on the streetdeals with themthey’re dealing with them for a fewhours uh whether it be during interviewsor during processingbut we get to deal with them for thelifetime forbreakfast lunch dinner recreation goodbad healthy sickwhatever um and they’rea strange group of folks they really areyeah and they really get to know you toobecause you see them every day so whenthey get outif they get out um they’re going to knowyou they’re going to pick you offyeah they they try to get to know youand and that was part of beinga prison guard was you don’t give themthat personal information youdon’t befriend them umi have nothing in common with them otherthan i’m walking up and down the samesame hallways but other than that i’vegot no rapfor them i’m going to treat them withrespect i’m going to give them whateverthey got comingwhatever the state says that they’rethey’re due whether it betoiletries or warmth oror you know um safetyor meals i don’t have a problem withthat that’s what the state says thatthey they’re due and that’s what we’regoing to make sure that they’re they’regettingbut i’m not going to chat about baseballscores or what’s going on on the weekendori don’t have any interest in that andunfortunately thefolks that do um find themselveswith a lot of problems yeah that wouldbe really hard for me man i’m a talkeri’d be in there it would be you knowtwo hours in i’d be um you know tellingmy life story oh yeah well it’s hard tounring the bellyou know what i’m saying and that’swhere a lot of them failand that’s a huge part of our trainingis is if you’re looking for a friendthe the cat that you’re monitoring is isnot your friendyou want to befriend your staff and it’ssome people get it and some people haveno problem with itum throughout my entire career i wasfortunate enough that i hadjobs that i was someplace differentliterally every every week i was whatwas known as a vacation relief as anofficer i i loved it so much that aswhen i became a sergeant i went andbecame vacation reliefand then as a lieutenant uh when ipromoted againi did the same thing i had relief umjobs and so basically i was someplacedifferentall the time so for anyone to really getto know me was veryhard i was never in one place longenough for you to patternme and i liked it that way and i pickedupon that young you know as a youngofficerin my career and i liked that because isaw other officers falling into that ruti saw other staff members following intothat rut where they were too chittychattyum i i didn’t need that i wasn’t lookingfor asocial experience while working inside aprisonright yeah absolutely ken um i hear yousometimes um talking here but yourvolume sounds kind of low justfyi uh let me see umcharles the i have a question for youwhen i was inpolice academy they showed um you knowthere’s a bigmax security prison in massachusettscalled walpolei think it’s called something else nowbut it wascedar cedar something but it wasit’s got a much prettier name but theyused to just call it walpole and theyshowed us a prison riot video and it waslike from i think the 70s or 80sand during the video they’re trying tolock the place down and then all of asudden the pump shotgun slides into thecamera view and it’s like and they’relike yeah backwhenever this video was shot there werefirearms in the prisonlike the guards were armed and uh inever thought to ask it but umwhen did they decide that was not a goodidea anymore did you guys were you guysarmed in there or was it um only likeperimeter guysyeah the only people with any kind of uhfirearm uh post would bethe wall towers um that surround theprisons and the perimeter patrolsbecause that’s a bad idea right to havea gun inside umyeah it it sure is um understandthe officers now in new york arestarting tocarry chemical agents uh and in themaxes of course they’ve alwayshad their batons um but like anythingelseone against 60 one against a hundred imean you know theratios are frightening um i don’t carehow tough you areyour baton your chemical agent yourrestraint devices your keys can beremoved from you quite quicklyum like i said you can be the toughestguy in the room but if there’sif you’re outnumbered 20 to one you’renot that toughyeah and one prisoner with a with ahandgun is i meanit can do a lot of damage it’s a gamechangerwithout a doubt yeah and unfortunatelyum guns are smuggled into correctionfacilitiesas rare as it is cell phones aresmuggled into correctional facilitiesand very problematic um because thecommunications can’t be monitored andall sorts ofdeals and transactions are taking placeand then staff doesn’t see it comingthe contraband that gets into facilitiesis frightening enoughstaff brings in metal forks or metalspoons because they want to eatuh lunch or dinner with the utensil thatthey’re normally used tobut again you’re introducing an objectthat can bemade into a weapon fashioned into aweapon quite quickly umi was never one for that i i brought inplastic silverware plastic you knowknives plasticforks to eat my lunch my dinner with andand that always sufficed me for myentire career butit would always amaze me that peoplewould bring in some of the crazieststuff in the worldum thinking that well you know this areais ours and it’sit’s secure and inmates know not to goin there and you’re just like oh my goshyeah that’s when the trouble starts yeahyeahyeah yeah it’s kind of hard to tounderstand that mentality buthey the fight yeah umremember the story we had a week or twoago about the uh female we had a umcharles we had a female prison guard whowas having sex with the inmatesoh yeah oh absolutelyabsolutely absolutely and and for a timethe gangs were infiltrating the uh thesystems and they were uhbringing in either females or males forthe introduction of contraband orfor the introduction of sexual favorsand oh it’s a never-endingcycle um they just had a a staff memberup hereat one of the local uh prisons uh whowas arrestedby um investigators for bringing insynthetic marijuanai don’t get it i i don’t i don’tunderstand the mentality i don’tunderstandwhy would you give up a career in apension yeah you know what i meani mean i’m now collecting my pension andi’mi look at it every month i’m so thankfulthat i finished my careerand i was healthy when i went away umi i got to take care of my familywonderful insurance great co-workersand now i have a beautiful pension to domy retirementwith and i just i can’t for the love ofgodwrap my head around the fact that thesepeople are sleeping with inmatesintroducing contraband to the inmatepopulation oryou know just being stupid in anon-stupid zoneum i i don’t get it i havezero sympathy for him absolutely zerosympathyhuman nature never ceases to take overyou know it’s likeoh it’s like that’s what i call i callthem humansyeah because i can say it in the localgrocery store i can just kind of gohumansand when i see the stupid behavior andi’m not insulting anyone but it’s uhyou know you just got to kind of shakeyour head kind of wonder you knowwhere they come up with these theseideas you knowyeah it’s like they someone wants tooffer you you pull someone over forspeeding and they have ayou know a 50 or 100 sticking out ofthere you know like you knowit’s obvious and it’s like hey manunless that’s two to three milliondollarsi’m not taking it because i’m gonna losemy pension you got to replace that forme you knowexactly exactly and you can’t buy me forthati’m sorry you’re not going to buy me fora couple of million you can’t do it i’msorryi’m not for sale maybe maybe fivemillion charles i would do five i thinkohno i you know every morning as a guywhen you wake up and you still got toshave you know what you got to lookyourself in the eye and you got yourselfin the faceand of course i don’t have any problemssleeping at night and i don’t have anyproblem getting up in the morning andlooking myself in the mirrorum that’s that’s how i’ve lived myentire lifewell i don’t blame you for that charlesi’m looking at you right now and you gotoneyou’ve got a mustache with rival kenzgood looking bloke yes absolutelycharles and ken by the way you soundyou’re sounding better umthank you carl charles um carl’s that’sthe mixture between the two of youcharles can you tell us can we get intothis dannemora this 2015 prison breakhow does this happen in in modern timesthis seemsunbelievable when you read about um howthis went down i mean it sounds likesomething that would happenin mexico like what the hell happenedno you know whenwhen the story unfolded i was in myfirst year as theas a local municipal judge i had justfinished a 25-year career in correctionsum and it was surreal when you watchedit unravel and you were watching thenational media report it andand of course i was listening to the thenews reports at night like everyone elsewasin the foothills of the adirondacks andand you of coursewhat prompted me writing the book wasthe fact that i was likewhat in the hell are they talking aboutbecause unfortunately the media whowould would spintheir own uh stories andthey had so much of it wrong and that’swhat basically prompted thethe writing of the book but when you satthereand as a the story unfolded and you’relistening to the fact thata civilian employee had brought in thiscontraband and had brought in a ton ofcontraband and had been doing it for anumber of umfor a number of months you it was hardto wrap your head around itand we’ve just talked about those pointshow is it that you can befriend theseguys work in a maximum security prisonand think thatthis is going to end well i mean i justit was hard to wrap your head aroundjust how stupid do you have to beto be playing these games and thinkingthat this is going to turn out wellyeah so what was the um thethe weak link what was what was beingbrought inum well the weak link is joyce mitchellshe’s the uh the seamstressuh uh 50 year old joyce mitchell startedher career clinton correctional in inmarch of 08 um she was one of thosepeople thatum she was politically correctum she didn’t have a lot of common senseum type of a thing and she didn’t bringa lot of common sense to theto the uh the job unfortunatelyum but she knew the right people to getin the position that she was inand once she was there they theycouldn’t get rid of herum and she was problematic pretty muchright from right from the start she wasbringing inum stuff thatin the early days she was bringing instuff that you would look at and kind ofgo well that’s not really you know acrisisat least an outsider would look at thatand think that she was bringing incookies and brownies and packaged candyandoccasionally bringing in leftovers froma new recipe for the inmates to tryum now you would look at that maybe andsay well that’s not really problematicbut it’s the beginning of the end umyou know bringing in and introducing anykind of contraband or any kind of thingsfrom the street to the inmate populationisis no you don’t do it umonce she started that behavior earlyearly early in her careerit’s just a slippery slopeso she’s just being nice but reallyshe’s what she’s doing is forming bondswith these peopleabsolutely absolutely and again we wetouched on that earlier inour conversation um she had it in herhead and and understand she wasappropriately trained she was trainedlike the thousands of other people thatare in the same career as a civilianemployee umas rs as a security staff membershe was given the same training that hasworked for decades forthousands of staff members andas far as she was concerned it didn’tapply she felt that if she had acloser relationship with the inmatepopulation that they would do morefor her that she’d get more productionout of themthat they would be nicer to her and thatshe’d be less apt to becomemaybe victimized if it turned southsomedayunderstand she’s working in a new yorkstate’s largest maximum security prisonum she justshe was the wrong person in the wrongplace if you removejoyce mitchell from the formula uhclinton correctional does not have anescape in the uh in the spring or theearly summer of 2015.joyce mitchell is the catalyst got ityeah so take us through the um take usthrough the whole thing charles how itwent downoh gosh so again joyce mitchell sobasicallyin november of uh 2013 she’s assigned totaylor shop number oneso now she she has a job location whereshe’s consistently the person in chargeon a daily basis as early as julyof um 2014almost 11 months prior to the escapeclinton correctional’s administrationgets notification thatjoyce mitchell may be behavinginappropriatelyhaving inappropriate contact withinmates an investigation is launched inhouseand uh they can find no credence to itbasically in august of 2014joyce mitchell introduces contraband uhthey’re like a reading type glass thatglasses that have illuminated um bows onthemum so you see them advertised on tv thatif you want to read a bookin the darkness type of thing it willjust illuminate the book in front of youthis is the very first pieces ofcontraband that joyce mitchellintroduces to the um the president twopairs of these glasses for approximatelyten dollarsthat she had uh purchased uh she alsobrought in someexercise gloves september 14she’s making phone calls to inmatematt’s daughtermaking outside communication huge no-noas well um matt has access to makeuh contact with his daughter um butjoyce mitchell takes it upon herself todoit uh via her own personal cell phonefrom october of 2014 to juneof 2015 the time of the escapejoyce mitchell had succeeded uponsmugglingover 70 containers of black and orcayenne pepper what over70 containers of black or cayenne pepperunbelievable she had also brought inbacardi 151 wild turkey bourboncontraband food umenvelopes um paintbrushesuh andbut she she’s all in but she had beenall in since october of 2014.um she was once the inmateshad received in januaryum screwdriver bits and allen wrenchesthe first plot to escape from clintoncorrectional uh joyce mitchell wouldreceivedaily updates as to the progression ofthe escapeand the plan in february of 2015joyce mitchell would smuggle in sixhacksaw blades that she purchased fromthe local walmart store here in malonefor approximately six dollars she’d makea cake and put it in thereum she actually um brought him in insome frozen hamburger type of a scenariowowso uh she could get him into uh pastsecurityand approximately 133 days from the timethat she brought inthose uh hacksaw blades 133 daysuh inmate matt sweat were able to escapefrom new york state’s largest maximumsecurity prisonand these were these were bad guysthey were um david sweatuh was first to arrive at clintoncorrectional uh david sweatwas incarcerated this was his secondincarceration in new york state’sprison system uh he was incarcerated forthe um2002 killings of umroon county deputy sheriff kevin tarciaum basicallydavid sweat and his co-defendants haveambushed the deputyafter they had just burglarized afireworks slashgun store out of great bend pennsylvaniajust barely across the new yorkpennsylvania borderum they were transferring stolen weaponsfrom that burglary to sweat’s personalvehiclewhen they were happened upon by thebroom county deputythey saw the deputy approaching theyhid in the shadows and as the deputy gotout of his car and approached the stolenvehicleand david sweat’s personal vehiclevehicledavid sweat came out of the shadowsshootingover 15 rounds towards the deputystriking the deputynumber of times and the best one roundsnuck up underneath the vestgoing into the deputy’s uh intestinalareaknocking the deputy down at which timesweat gotin his personal honda accord running thedeputy overdragging him across the parking lotdeputy tarcia was still fighting when heemerged out from underneath the vehiclebadly bruised and banged up anddavid sweat and his co-defendants hadutilized the deputy’s ownhandgun and basically assassinated himin that parking lot with uhtwo rounds to the deputy’s head um thedeputy had defensive woundsactually going through his hands as hehailed his hands uptrying to deflect around so that’s thekind of cat that david sweat isrichard matt arrived at clintoncorrectionaltwo years behind sweat uh againhad spent his entire adolescent andyoung adult life incarcerated in oneshape or form had done a couple ofprevious state bidshe was given a second or a third or afourth chance whatever you want to callitby a businessman out of that buffaloareathat had a i’m going to call it agrocery slashuh meat business that they thisthis gentleman this william rickersonpurchasedproducts that were close to expirationdate and would wholesale them outto local businesses at a greatly reducedpriceum matt worked for him and shortly afterbeing employed by mr rickerson mattstarted to steal product from himand basically was undercutting pricesandand had his own sales route uh mrrickerson got wind of it cut bait withmattand matt felt that he was um wrongedand richard matt and a co-defendant wentto william rickerson’sresidence in mid-december of 1997where they abducted the um thebusinessmantook him kidnapped himbeat him violently uh 27 hours broughthim across a couple of different statelinesuh looking for what they thought werelarge sums of moneyuh returned back to new york state whererichard matt hadsnapped mr rickerson’s neck and theydisposed of the body along the umniagara riverman that’s brutal brutal guysboth of them brutal cats noso how do you working for joyce mitchellin the taylor shop joyce thought she hadherself a couple of nice boysboy was she fooled huh yeah yeahjoyce bought it lock stock and barrelyeahso how do how do these how do you getout of a modernprison like this wellagain um as crazy as it soundsum the six hacksaw blades broken in halfsmuggled in by joyce mitchell uhsmuggled back to this uhtheir cells uh mats and uh sweat cellsum after they’re broken in half handleswere fashionedutilizing just cloth material so theyhad something to hang on toand out of the back of their steelcells mat and sweat would continuouslyscrape that hacksaw blade against theback walluntil after a while they finally piercedthe steel of the back wallthis attempt to pierce the back wallwould be taking placeduring indoor recreation during thewinter months of januaryfebruary type of a scenario umonce the holes were piercedthen every night during recreationalactivities while the inmates wereindoorshaving their recreation for the fewhoursuh both inmates matt and sweat wouldstay up in theirthird floor third tier cells uh cuttingwhileone was cutting the other one waswatching the walkways to make sure thatno staff was coming down for roundsum and after 20 or 30 minutes of cuttingthey’d switch on and offone was on watch the other one wascuttingthey would cut approximately two inchesa nightand consider that a good night’s worknow how do they know they’re goingsomewhere oops go ahead i’m sorry stevecharles how do they know they’re goingsomewhere how do they know they’recutting what are they cutting intoisrael they umsweat and matt had both had access tothe areas behind their cellswe refer to those areas as catwalkswhat you find back there is it’s a steelgrate that you walkon andthe the catwalk area contains all theplumbingall the electrical all the services andutilities thatgo into the cells and as you walk downthe catwalk they’re kind of narrowon the right-hand side is approximately50 cellsper floor on the left-hand side isanother 50 cellsapproximately and then you had threestories of thatum so if there was a plumbing problem oran electrical problem ora utility problem of some sort uh staffcould accessthose catwalks work on the plumbing orwork on the electricaland never have contact with the inmatewhile they were still in their cellum both sweat and matt were familiarwith those areassweat had uh access to those areas uh hehad been performing uh illegalillegal um electrical activityum with the um the electricuh feeding into the individual cells hewas kind of making them so they wouldhandle a little bit more of a drawelectrical drawbenefiting the inmate that was insidethat cell for runninghot pots or stingers as they referred tothemas well as their televisions any otherpossible appliances that they had intheretype of a thing sohe was familiar with the area so theyknew that that wouldget them out of their cells and into thecatwalk areaand then they also knew that basicallythree stories downwould be the subterranean tunnels inyour prisons all your utilities all yourservices rununderground none of your services runoverhead so all your heat comes inundergroundall your plumbingall your electrical all your telephoneeverything runs undergroundwe don’t have wires and plumbing goingover fenceseverything is under the under the groundand they knew that if they followed thatsubterranean tunnels and followed thoseheat pipesand water sources and electrical sourcesit would lead them to an exitsome way out that’s crazy ken did youknow there was all that stuff going onbehind the prisonthe the cell walls i knew that i knewall about i didn’t know anything aboutthatpimp yeah that’s crazy yeah in these intheseprisons like i said every all yourservices go underground especiallyin your old prisons and the the subtraining tunnels are big enough whereyou canwalk through them uh you know standingup and you canyou know do whatever you gotta do ifthere’s maintenance to be doneyou know in the sub training tunnelsit’s easily doneum they were familiar with that theythey knew thatum so that that was their ultimate goalwas to get into those sub trainingtunnels and see where they brought themnow were they were they they really hidthis there was no it was just them inthe seamstressthere was nobody else turning you knowturning their heador looking away well there wasn’t therewasn’tthere there was in the earlier stagesjust the two of them and the seamstressumno one else was party of it howeverat 11 o’clock at night or5 30 in the morning your housemy house in the big house are all prettyquietand if a mouse is making its way downthrough theback of those walls or acat or a 140 poundman you know and i both know thatyou can only be so quiet nowdavid sweat thought of himself as beinga little bit of a ninjatype of a thing that he felt that he wasable to move quite quietlybut you and i both know that i live uphere in like i saiduh farm country and it’s not unusual inthese older houses that you might get amousein in the ceiling or something um itsounds like a bulldozer at 11 o’clock atnightyeah um matt and sweatonce they breach the back of their cellswe’re making nightly runs for the mostpart every single night during that 133daysand in using the pipes and thedifferent pieces of plumbing asfootholds and hand holdsthere’s no way thata hundred plus man or two of themcan go up and down and climb off allthat stuff and not make noiseum it got to the point wherefinally the guy that lived next door tomatt now understand matt and sweat liveup on thethe third tier the third floor of thishousing unit this blockmatt was cutting one night and theneighbor hadn’t gone to recreationand as his neighbor hears inmate mattsawing on the back wall and he goes yohacksaw that was matt’s nicknameyo hacksaw what the hell are you doingand matt’s like ohoh i’m cutting canvas the paint and ofcourse the inmate next doorwas smart enough to know that you knowhacksaw is the guy thatreturned to the crime scene of wherethey had dumped mr rickerson’s bodyalong the niagara riverand took a hacksaw and cut mr rickersonup and threw him into the niagara riverum thus his nickname hacksaw but hacksawprobably wasn’t the guy that you wantedtoplay games with um he you know what i’msaying heprobably wasn’t real warm and fuzzy soyou could start accusing himyou didn’t want to be the guy toquestion him with regards to what was hedoingso um it went withoutfurther question but then all of asudden matt is befriending this inmatenext door to him andpromising him giving him differentthings um prized possession of hiscolor tv would be given to the inmatethe evening before they escapeum a crazy amount of food and bowls andstuff were given to that same inmatethe day before the escape uh assuringthat that inmatewas going to sleep well that particularevening and probably not reallyknow of anything that might be possiblygoing on so there’s no doubt inmy mind inmate population knew forquite a while that these guys were ontheir way outum and then the other contributingfactor to thatwas days prior to the escapethere was a disturbance out in the yardthat clinton correctionalnow inmates just can’t go up to hisstaff and go heyi think uh it make not an mh sweater ontheir way outi think they’re they’re attempting toescape because ifan inmate does that their career incorrectionsand living amongst the other inmates isgoing to be quite shortbecause someone’s going to kill them sobut there’s there’s no honor lost in ifthere’s amass disturbance out in the yard andchemical agents are deployed and staffhas to respond andthen the facility is locked down andhistoricallyin maximum security prisons once they’relocked down and after amajor disturbance like that they do afacility-wide friskit’s what we do the inmateswho have been seasoned and that havedone any kind of time at allknow that that’s what we doso to save face it’s the opinion ofmyselfand in the book the inmates engineeredthis disturbancedays prior to the escapeand the administrationdid exactly what the inmates were hopingthey were going to dothe administration superintendent steverossettcontacted the albanyfigures head of correction the leadersof department of corrections and saidi’d like to lock down my facilitybecause he hasn’t got the ability to doit on his ownand i want to do a facility-wide friskhis request was deniedsuperintendent reset his first depthand his depth of security between thethree of them had over 100 years ofexperience incorrections two out of the three of themwere second generation prison guardsand the bureaucratic systemunfortunatelysaid oh my gosh the tea leaves show thatyour facility isrunning fine and you don’t have any moreproblems this year than what you hadlast year and it’s expensive it’s goingto cost us overtime if you shut downyour facilityoh it always comes down to money comesdown to moneyand it did and they told him to cowboyup and run their jaila few days later we had a wholedifferent problemyes hellotwo days we’re on the edge of our seatsherea few days later you got two missinginmates 5 30 in the morning the officeris doing his uhrounds doing his standing count you haveto bestanding uh at 5 30 in the morning inthese maximum security prisonsthe officer is walking down that tier upon the third floorthe cell lights in sweat cell as well asmax cell or noton he gets to the first celldavid sweat is not in his rackhe bangs on the bed there’s a figure inthere butthey’re not moving he out of frustrationpullsthe sheets off and revealsa mannequin type dummy a homemadefigure with sweatpants stuffed withother clothing itemssweatshirt stuffed with other clothingitems umand and david sweat is nowhere to befoundthe officer moves to the next cellimmediately richard mattfinds the same thing at approximately 530on june 6 2015.wow so these guys when they exitwhat are they exiting into is it like aswamp i’m picturing like uhlike some kind of like what they did isthat 133 daysit was a maze it was it took thema lot of um triesand they did they they wiggled theyshimmied theyhad to wiggle through walls and tightopenings and they were able to followthe steamline that provided heat throughout theentire facilityand they’re able to follow that steamline to where it piercedthe perimeter wall umthe steam pipe itself as it pierced theperimeter wallwas encased in a sleeves andthe inmates were able to see between thesteam pipeand that sleeve and see the continuationof againthe um the subterranean tunnelsso their initial thought was we’re atthe baseof the perimeter wall they pretty muchknew where they wereand they were going to start chippingaway at the perimeter wall and theyas they chipped away at it with onlyhand tools withchisels and and the eight pound sledgehammer that they hadcommandeered from a construction job boxthey had joked how in shawshankandy dufresne took i believe 20 years toescapechipping away at the concretethey figured that with the tools thatthey had available to them they weregoing to do it in10 and that was the joke amongst thesetwoand as they were chipping away in maythe heat was intense where they wereworking because they were right next tothe steam pipe that was providing heatfor the entire facility as it came intothe facilitya few days into may theclinton correctional facility shut itsheating system downbecause they were going into the springseason no longer necessary to heatthe blocks uh for inmate comfortand so the temperature changed immenselylooking at this 20 pluspipe that pierced this wall versusthe feet of concrete that they werechipping away at the option becamethat’scut through the casing of the pipeso they cut an entrance hole through thepipeshimmy down the pipe approximately 12 to15 feetand cut an exit hole now that gives meclaustrophobia thinking it would cutapproximately 10 incheswowthat’s that’s freaky yeah go aheadso that just gives me claustrophobiathinking about it i mean that i meanyou don’t know what the hell’s downthere ohoh yeah and and understand now here’swhere it gets you knowyou have to look at this and it’s justit’s the perfect stormas they were making their way throughthe the pipesit was like a scavenger hunt they foundall sorts of different thingsthat they utilized in this escapejust debris that had beenthrown off to the side they had found awork light that had been left behind atoneparticular area they had founda broken broom handle that was downamongst the debristhey found a piece of re-rod that wasfound amongst the debrisas well as other items now they took thepiece of re-rodand they were able to cut itthe end of it to a tip to a pointed tipand they used that as a crude typechiselthat they would utilize to chip away atsome of the uh the walls that they hadto make the openings a bit bigger sothey could sneak throughso they would utilize that piece ofre-rod as aas a chisel type tool theyutilize the extension corddavid sweat’s previous bidhe had spent some time at washingtoncorrectional facilitywhile at washington correctionalfacility he was an electrician’s helperdavid sweat was able to take thatelectrical cordand bug it into the electrical that wasfound down in that area where he wasworkingand it provided him with not only lightbut then he smuggled a fan downfrom their cells and they utilize thatto move the air to make it a little morecomfortable while they workin those the confines of that base ofthe perimeter wallthey utilize the broken stick the brokenhandleas a measuring device trying to figureout approximately how much wall theywere trying to chip throughum and how much pipe they had to shimmydownwhen it came time to cut through thepipe so that they didn’t cut their exitholeand still be facing perimeter wall theywanted to get beyondthe other side of that perimeter wall sowhatever they found they werequickly utilizing it to aid them intheir escapeit’s like a video game they’re pickingup all kinds of extra toolsunbelievable unbelievable and to thinkagainthey started with simply six hacksawbladesand were able to utilize those thoseitemsand after approximately 133 days uh theywere out street levelone block from the facility had amanhole now they had gone all the waydownto the powerhouse that’s where that thatonce they exited the facility andfollowed that steam pipe it brought themdown towhat’s known as the powerhouse wherethey generate the heatto heat the facility it’s held thepowerhouse is offfacility grounds the exit gatethe steel gate was wide open but there’sstaff24 hours a day seven days a week at thepowerhouse monitoring the boilers andmonitoring the powerhouseso they elected not to just walk throughthe gate to freedomthey backtracked one block and decidedto exitthe freedom through a manhole a manholewas held in place by a simple chain andlock and they utilize their hacksawbladesto cut that final obstaclethis was all done actually on june5th um but it was getting pretty closeto the five o’clockhour and they knew that they wouldn’thave enough timeto get a good head start on their escapeso they returned back to the facilitythe escape route now is completely openready for them to goit was a friday they spent their lastday of incarceration on a friday atclinton correctionalwhere richard matt asholding true to form had been givingjoyce mitchell daily updatesadvised joyce mitchell that at midnightsaturday morning that they would bewaiting for her to pick them upat that four-way intersection that theycould clearly seefrom the taylor shop where they workedwow ken you got a questionyeah i was going to ask how how how wasuhwas it joyce mitchell how she wasinvolved up to this pointas far as them escaping and then whather roleafter that is why was she gettingupdates sojoyce mitchell again she was gettingupdates right fromfrom day one right from january rightstraight throughuh january 15th um she brought inagain the first so-called escape toolsum screwdriver bit security bits allenwrenchesum and then shortly thereafterapproximately a month later she broughtin the hacksaw blades um but she wasgetting daily updates as to theprogression of the escapeand she became a a ruling participantum basically 15 daysprior to the escape mitchell started toassembleum things that were going to be neededforlife on the run um she had her jeep withits gpsshe had put together compass tentsleeping bagsfishing poles um she had umguns uh she had a hatchet she hadum ammunition and more hacksaw blades sothey couldcut the ends off the shotgun that shealso had in her possessionjoyce mitchell was all in umjoyce mitchell had ample opportunityevery single dayto go to an administrator or to go tosomeone and sayi think i’ve made a mistake andjoyce mitchell chose not to and she wasin love with both of them or they werejust kind ofleaning around joyce mitchell waswas absolutely infatuated with with bothof them she had started with sweatwith her silly games with david sweatshe was always she was a touchy feelygirlshe always had her arms right droppedher draped around them she was alwaystouchy-feelyalways wanted to engage this younger ladsweat in some sort of a conversationwent out of her way to the point wherefinally sweat actually ended up gettingremoved from her tailor shopbecause it had become so oblivious orshe was oblivious to it butit becomes so apparent to everyone elseum thatfinally the administration had moved inand separated the two of themwith strict orders that he was to benowhere near uhjoyce mitchell’s tailor shop umso who comes in butsweat’s partner matt nowmatt was a master of manipulation uh hehad beensteering sweat in the direction that heneeded to uhto completely manipulate joyce mitchellum matt was he’d been a manipulator hisentire lifeand he simply took over sweat’s placeand actually had sexual contactand sexual relations with joyce mitchellumi mean he just took it to a whole newlevel without a doubtand matt was the one that was givingjoyce mitchell the daily updatesum and passing love notes back and forththat sweat wouldput together to keep joyce mitchellsucked inuh joyce mitchell was sending nudephotographs of herselfback through matt to sweat i mean it wasjustquite a quite a show needless to saywow so they definitely um as soon as shepicked him up and they definitely hadsomethere’s some romantic um thingshappeningin joyce mitchell’s head yes oh yeahjoyce mitchell figured that these twowere going to be thethe new adventure in her life joycemitchell felt that she was missingsomethinguh in life and that these two were goingto fulfillwhatever fantasies or whatever that voidwas that she felt that she was missingshe figured these two cats were the onesthat were going to fill that void forherum so she was all in 100 nowof course once she layered up and onceshe you know spent a little time in thecounty jailand once she did you know her little bitof her little timethat she did in the state’s maximumsecurity president bedford hillsof course her tune has changed but ifyou go back and look at the nbcuh interview with matt lauer uh she’s adefiantpompous little snot that umtook no responsibility whatsoever and uhplaysthe uh the sad song of i’m a victimand i i felt scared for my family andfelt scared for my husband and the onlyperson who put her husband and herfamily at risk was hersadly oh yeah i’m sure her husband wasthrilled with all the details he gotabout thiswell sadly her husband stuck by herthrough thick and thin um patheticallyum she’s out of prison now she servedapproximately a little better than threequarters of her sentence and uminstead of serving the full seven yearsin change she didapproximately five years and changed andjoyce mitchell isback uh living up here in the northcountry where we arewow and um oh andcollecting her retirement whatdon’t you love the system new york is asbad as californiaretirement how does that happen charleswell you know you i guess you’d have toask those all the smart people how thathappens but the law has since beenchanged butyeah joyce mitchell uh with her years ofservice now understand she’s not gettinga huge pensionbut she’s still getting something umthe the actions that she helpeduh create cost the taxpayersin this state millions of dollars thenumber that was thrown out wasapproximately a milliondollars a day while the escape ran andso the new york tate taxpayers were onthecuff for approximately 23 millionthat doesn’t include the millions ofdollars spent by the federal authoritiesinvolvedand my research said that was in theneighborhood of 60million dollars joyce mitchell and thedamage done to that facility waswas given during her sentencea bill for in the neighborhood of eightythousand dollars as wasuh david sweat uh richard matt waskilledat the uh on day 21 of the 23 daysurge butyeah yeah joyce mitchell was eligiblefor her retirementat age 55 uh she was able to retireand draw what little pension you knowshe only had umpteen years of servicewith the with the statebut she had some service working for theschool system years priorand that all added uh towards her finalaverage for her uh retirement benefitoh it’s glad good to hear she wasworking with children that’s greatyeah she was i’m detecting a littlesarcasm there yeahso charles these guys were out for threeweeksand um i know one of them got shot theother one got captured but uhdid they where did they wreak any havocwhen they were out or was it pretty muchjust hidingbasically in this iswhere the story really has some amazingthe whole story isis amazing as far as i’m concerned thetruth is without a doubt stranger thanfiction hereum matt had a history of escapes richardmatthad the four previous escapes prior tothe escape from clinton correctionaluh two of the four were successfulclinton correctional will be the thirdsuccessful escapeum out of five uh for for mattand matt’s last escape escape fromclintonwas um basically the same as his veryfirst escapeback in 1979 he escaped from a youthhomeover in the allegheny state park areaand matt would when he escaped from thatyouth homehe was moving from campsite to campsiteseasonal homesum in that allegheny state park area andthere he would pilferfood supplies beverages that kind ofthing spend a little bit of time at aparticular camp and then move onleave no real telltale signs that he hadbeen therejust to survive and his first escape wasvery indicative of his last um matt andsweat hadburglarized a number of seasonal campsin the foothills of the adirondacks andwent undetected for basicallyum you know two plus weeks umbefore that they were stumbled upon by aoff-duty correctional officerjohn stockwell who was checking on oneof hiscamps type of a scenario soum it was amazing they didn’t leave anytelltale signs they burglarized a numberof campsum it wasn’t until they were kind ofbumped by stockwellaka stumpy as we call him uh john iworked with johnum that they kind of raised a littlehellafter that because they were moving alittle bit quickerand they weren’t the chase was onand so they weren’t being as cautiousprior to thatwhile at john stockwell’s campcamp twisted horn was the name of thecampthey were enjoying pasta that was leftin the campby stockwell and the other people thatwere in and out of the campum homemade um jelly peanut butteruh they were they were living prettygood they were listening touh local news on a radio that was therethey were listening to a station out oflake placid home of the1932 and 1980 winter olympics uh theywere living pretty comfortablewhat are the chances for prison guardfindings i had absolutelyno idea where they were the lawenforcement had absolutely no idea wherethese two guys werethey were chasing hundreds and nowthey’re up and well into the thousandsor up to well over a thousand leads andthey had no idea where these two guyshad gotten to themum wow that’s uh andone of them surrendered but one of themgot killed right you’re like well sostockwell bumps him out of camp twistedhornthis is my favorite chapter in the bookjohn bumps him outtwisted horn is approximately threemiles offthe closest road if you can call it thatthe wolf pond road wolf pond road is apoor example of atwo-lane dirt road it’sit’s more like a two-lane pathfor um for vehicle trafficum john stockwell to gain access to hiscamp would drive down the wolf pond roadturn off the wolf pond road heading uptowards his campand he would travel for a handful ofminutes until he got to like a parkingarea where he wouldabandon his four-wheel drive vehicle andthenunload a all-terrain vehicle from hispickup truckand then he would have approximately amile and a half just shy of two miletrek up this pathwith loose boulders and washed out areastocamp so on anice little saturday morning in in umin the spring john had wiggled on up totwisted horn just to check on some gamecamerasto check on cam had his wife’s cellphone inhis pocket and had brought a handgunwith himas he approaches camp he has his dogwith him he has a lab with him and thedogtakes off towards camp and alerts andstarts to bark andstarts to really raise hell and the hairin the back of the dog’s neck isup and the dog is challengingcamp he’s barking crazy at campjohn’s approach to camp was wellannounced from the powerfulatv engine john dismounts the atvstarts to walk towards camp and he seesa figurewalk past a doorway a glass doorwaythe bunkhouse part of camp john takes astep backdraws his handgun and challengeswhoever’s insidejohn uses some colorful language andchallenges whoever’s inside you bettercome outi’ve got a gun and he sees anotherfigure run by that windowdog is still alerting then withinsecondsjohn hears crashing and banging andbooming through the back doorsof camp heading into the brush behindcampout of his field of view so john hurriesupjumps on the atv and starts racing backto his truckafter a second or two he’s like ah nutsand he yells for his dogdollydolly finally catches up and johncontinues to make his trek towards histruckgoing as fast as dolly could run johngets back to his truck jumps in histruck and takes off for againa little better than a mile plus to justget back to thetwo-lane path known as the umwolf pawn road the first few secondsjohn’s clicking as hard as that truckwill go and then he looks in his rearview mirrors and slams on the brakeshe hadn’t disconnected the ramps that hehad utilized to unload the atv from histruckso john’s lost a considerable amount oftime nowhe continues to make his way finallydown to the wolf pond roadgets on the wolf pond road travels alittle ways heading towards civilizationwhere he’s hoping that he might be ableto get a cell phone signalbecause the whole premise of this is thefact that he has no cell phone coveragein the foothills of the adirondackswhere his camp was locatedand he knew he wouldn’t get any kind ofa signal until he got closer towardscivilization he comes across a group ofother peoplewithin a short distance probably a mileor two from camp camp roadstops and tells them what it justhappened and all of them break out theircell phonesand as we affectionately refer to it asthey all start to do the cell phonedancewhere everybody’s got their cell phoneup in the air and they’re all trying toget a signalno one was able to find a signal andjohn’s like jesus christ i’ve lostenough time already i don’t have timefor this gamejohn continues down the road a littlebit further to where he finally gets asignaljohn stops he makes a phone call hedials 9-1-1identifies himself tells him that he’sjust had a chance encounter withan individual maybe two he’s not sure athis remote camplocated up off the wolf pond road in themiddle of goddamn nowhere in franklincountyhe’s getting into describing furtherevents when the cellphone signal drops911 attempts to contact john a number oftimesthey cannot make contact with johnstockwell911 contacts john stockwell’s homehis wife answers the phonethis is the 911 operator we’re trying tomake contact with john stockwellhe just called us saying that he’s hadan encounter with one possibly twopeople at his remote camp in theadirondack foothillsand the call has been dropped and wecan’t get back to himdo you know where we could find himjohn stockwell’s wife’s heartdrops and she’s like oh my godshe holds it together and she walksthroughhow to find john at this remote camp andas quickly as the college started with911they hang up they had their informationthat they neededmoments later john stockwell’s wifewatches a unbelievable parade oflaw enforcement vehicles racing past herhouse heading towards the wolf pond roadand then she sees helicopters flyingoverhead heading in the same directionthat’s can’t twist itguess you’ll probably have to get thebook to find out how it turns out[Laughter]oh man that is um that is unbelievablestoryso cool the uh yeah so ultimately therehelater he’s found one of them shot one ofthem’s recaptured andhopefully hasn’t escaped right a fewdays yeah a few days laterum another off-duty correctional officerchecking campuh comes across umliquor that had been poured or spilledall over a countertopyou could tell that camp he’d beenchecking on a daily basis he could tellsomeone had been in campum contacted his father going hey haveyou been up to campsomebody’s been in camp they’ve spilledliquor all over the place you knowyou can tell somebody’s been in there uhfather’s like hell nocheck with um one of the other guys guyby the name of paul marloweanother camp member paul answers thephone and again no i’ve been up to campbut i’m on my way down with a gunand i’ll i’ll come down and help youclear it paul marlow and this well thatkidcorrectional officer off duty uh clearcampthey look it over paul marlow calls uhlaw enforcement says hey we’re at aagain acamp up off the main road about 30 southjust south of malone there’s been somedisturbance in the campand so law enforcement starts heading upthat waybut can’t find the camp because there’sagain no 911 address for these remotecampsso they asked paul marlow to sit alongroute 30 southand flag down the first troop car thathe sees go byso far paul marlow’s sitting along theside of the roadand while he sits there and i understandhe only been there for a minute or twohe hearsa gunshot so he contactsagain law enforcement and says heysomebody’s shooting solaw enforcement advises them immediatelyget usthe closest 911 address from where youare so we can we got patrols in the areabut they still can’t find youso paul marlowe travels to the closest911 addressunknowingly driving pastrichard matt who had just shotat passing vehiclesas soon as paul marlow wasnotifying law enforcement of the 911addresstwo unmarked cars appeared immediatelypaul marlow gets out identifies himselftells him whether he’s hearing the shotsand while law enforcement isinterviewing paul marlow two more shotsring outand they’re trying to pinpoint thedirection made difficult by the echo ofthe mountainsso once again umafter the second shot had rang out acaravan of three vehiclestwo vehicles two pickup trucks towingcampers one pickup truck towing aboat were pulling over behind lawenforcementgot vehicles uh the drivers got outchecked tiresand then got back in their vehicles andstarted heading backonto route 30 heading in the southerndirectionlaw enforcement stopped the campersand just quickly talked with them andthey thought maybe they had blown a tireunbeknownst to law enforcement as wellas the owner of the camperthe camper had literally been shot justmoments earlierlaw enforcement identified the sounds ofthe gunshotsidentified the areas from where theywere coming from and immediately set upperimeterthe best that they could under thecircumstanceshours later vortechwhich is the border patrol eliteteams had made contact with richard mattrichard matt was ordered by vortechsupervisor chris voss to show his handsrichard matt refused to comply butinsteadbrought a shotgunpointing it towards the vortechcommanderchris voss engaged richard mattwith his m4and taking the suspect into custody mattwas killed as a result of the encounterbam vortec after matt was securedimmediately researched the area with theassistance offbi tactical teams vortech tacticalteams as well as state troopersand other law enforcement agencies andcame to the determination that richardthat david sweat was nowhere to be foundand sweat wouldn’t be seen or heard fromfor a few more dayscharles when you have a prisoner likethat escapeyou can basically shoot him right i meanhe’s escapedfelon you don’t have to absolutelyabsolutelyunder the way the laws are written anescaped prisonercan be shot absolutely the threshold ismuch lower you don’t have to give themyou knowabsolutely yeah it’s a whole differentgame changer yeah without a doubtwithout a doubt charles that is one hellof a story man umthank you so much for coming on nowyou’re telling it you’re you’recapture of sweat and againunbelievable uh david sweatand richard nat now when richard mattwas capturedthey have traveled well over 30 plusmilesin a western direction from clintoncorrectionalfrom denmark richard mattthese guys had been bushwhacked theytraveled cross-country very little bitof this traffic that they had donewas along roadsides a lot of theirtravel was donebushwhacking at the time of david or atthe time of richard matt’s captureand subsequent shooting deathmatt was about 10 miles from joycemitchell’s front porchit’s long less low that wasno doubt in my mind matt was was on amissionand matt had an agenda and matt was onhis way to dickinson new yorkto see joyce mitchelldavid sweat had been arguing with matttowards the end of their runenough with this western direction let’shead north let’s go to canada let’s getout of herebecause canada is so close canada fromclinton correctional was 25 miles fromthe prisonand from where matt was shot andkilled less than a basically15 18 milessweat had been advocating and arguingwith mattlet’s go to canada matt and sweat hadseparated just a couple of days prior tomatt’s captureand death sweat was on his way to canadatwo days after matt’s deatha new york state trooper from troop bsergeant jay cook was on patrol byhimselfjay cook was patrolling roads in thearea ofwhat’s known as trout river in constablenew york jay cook wasbasically in his own neighborhoodas jay cook had come down the coveytownroadhe observed an individual in camouflagewith a backpackhiking across a meadow of alfalfameadow less than two miles from thecanadian borderheading north towards canadajay cook’s initial thought was homelooks like one of our guysand as he got just a little bit closerwith the troop carhe stopped and yelled to the individualheythe individual turned around it’s alldead broturned back around and continued to headnorthsergeant cook immediately identified himas david sweptsergeant cook immediately ordered davidsweathey come here anddavid sweat continued to headtowards canada sergeant cook immediatelyexited the troop car and gave foot chaserunning through a pretty deep ditchgetting up into the meadowby then sweat had a pretty good leadthe sergeant with all of his duty beltand gear was kind of slowed downbut he was kind of gaining on sweatuntil sweat dumped the backpackthat he was carrying and then sweatstarted to open up some distanceheading towards the tree line thesergeant knew that if he got to the treelinehe was going to be within range ofcanada quite quickly andhis ability to take him into custodywould be no longer therecook ordered him a number of times tostop that he was going to shootsweat continued to open up groundheading north towards canadasergeant cook took a shooting stanceand with his glock service revolver shotthe first roundstriking sweat in the shoulderdid not knock him to the ground but youcould see sweat stumblesergeant cook ordered swept to stopagain that he was going to shootwhat continued to run towards the treelinesergeant cook fired the second roundagain striking sweat knocking him to thegroundthe sergeant called in making known hislocationas his different assorted backup unitstarted to arrivesergeant cook was standing in betweensweatand canada and at gunpoint was davidsweatfirst aid was immediately rendered tosweat sweat was immediatelytaken into custodywhen they did the measurementsthey figured that sergeant cook had runapproximately 100 yards in pursuitstopped took a shooting stance and shotagainin the neighborhood of 100 yardsstriking a moving target twicewow good shotoh my gosh usually you make the make theguys do a couple jumping jacks nobodycan hit their target you knowyeah yeah it’s my understanding that uhstate police nowum kind of give them uhwhen they they’re qualifying they’regiving the guys opportunity to run 100yards andshoot at 100 yards just to kind of seejust what that was all aboutjay cook is a as a hell of a guy i hadthe opportunity to talk to jay cook anumber of timesuh sergeant cook was a frequent flyer inand out of our courtcouldn’t ask for a nicer man and it’snice to see a hometown guybring this madness to an end hell yeah imean you can’t get more dramatic thanthat charlesi mean you can’t get more dramatic thanthat he shoots a guyon the run then he stands between himand canadawell he’s taking less than uh my ownchange in the area but my own changefrom canadian borderi can see why hollywood’s all over thestory i mean it’s it’samazing yeah yeah then uh ben stillercame up they did aseven part eight part series on itunfortunatelyum they didn’t do it justiceum there’s been a handful of bookswritten about itwe seem to be getting uh most of theattentionwe had no agenda on our book we justwanted to tell the storylike i said the spirit of the book wasreal simple when we wrote iti was tired of all the misinformationabout the false news reports about thedifferent agendas of the differentpeople that were reporting umand we had just one agenda one agendaonly and that was just to tell the truthand tell the storythis story is just it’s mind-bogglingit’s amazingand the twists and turns in it there’smore twists and turns in this thing wehaven’t even touched the surfacei’m sure twisted turns of this book it’sit’s crazyit’s got a hollywood twist involving uhuhharry warner with warner brotherstelevision um there was a chanceencounter withmatt and um the granddaughter of uhharry warner warner brothers televisionhis his granddaughterdesiree telstar um they’ve gotinvolvement in thisi mean this this book and this storyhas got so many twists and turns it’sit’s unbelievableit’s just crazy well if there’s a choiceout there of books to readcertainly i would recommend yours you’reyou have the inside track you’re goingto have all that you can tell you justhave theyou have the accurate information it’sumit’s truly amazing i wish those i wishben stiller and those guys had reachedout to youyeah well it would have been a wholedifferent uh series hattiei’ll tell you that well charles thankyou so much for coming on and sharingthat where can peopleget your book where can they buy itdenimuraum two escape killers three weeks ofterror and the largest manhunt ever innew york state is available basicallyanywhere books are soldamazon um is without a doubt uhuh the big one uh but you can go towalmart’s uhyou can go anywhere books are sold andget itwe’re uh we’ve gone from the hardcoverwe’re now at thepaperback version uh there’s a digitalbook out thereso yeah there’s three different formatsavailable right nowawesome ken you have any more questionsfor uh mr gardnerno i’m good good story awesomethanks well thank you again sir forcoming on and uh i will put links toyour book in the show notes and i alsoput them on our website so everybody cango pick up a copy and check it out umandwith that i will uh i’ll do our outrosthank you charlessteve ken thank you for taking the timeand thank you for the interest in ourbookthank you hey guys i hope you enjoyedthe episodeif you’d like to support the show goover to thingspolice.comwhen you get on the website there’s afew different ways you can show somesupport you candonate directly you can do a one-timedonationor a monthly donation even a buckhelps us keep the lights on over herepays our expenses for the monthis greatly appreciated you can also justuse our amazon affiliate link if youjustwant to buy something on amazon like younormally do just do it through our linkand we’ll get a little kickback for thatso you can go to the website and do thatoruh in the show notes i’ll put a link youcan just click right through that linkand the third way is you can buy some uhyou can buy some merchso we have um coffee mugswe have t-shirts men’s and women’s andwe also have hoodie sweatshirts now souh go over to thingsplc.com and check itout you can also just um listen to thepodcast thereor you can apply to be a guest justscroll down toand click on be a guest and what youwant to do is justgive us a brief uh synopsis of yourof your service how many years you uhwere on the job and uh justa very brief idea of the stories you’dlike to share and i will get right backto youso thank you for listening and we’llcatch you next timeyouEnglish (auto-generated)
