The search for two convicted killers in New York shifted after a possible sighting in the southern part of the state, 565km from the prison where the men escaped two weeks ago.
New York State Police spokesman Beau Duffy said officers were investigating a possible sighting of the prisoners in Allegany County near the Pennsylvania border.
A person spotted two men on Saturday near a railroad line in the town of Friendship, state police said.
Photo: Reuters
David Sweat and Richard Matt on June 6 escaped from the Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, near the Canadian border, breaking out of the maximum-security prison using power tools.
A door-to-door search involving up to 800 law enforcement officers has been underway since then, concentrated in a several-kilometer radius of woods and fields around the prison in the Adirondacks.
State police on Saturday moved the search command post from the prison to nearby Cadyville and focused attention on the other side of the state, advising the public to report suspicious activity and asking residents living in the Friendship area along the New York-Pennsylvania border to be on alert.
The two men are “very dangerous” and should not be approached, state police said.
Several roads in Friendship were blocked off and the police used helicopters and search dogs in the hunt. Resident Darryl Ross told the Leader newspaper that he was securing his property.
“I was a little concerned. You have these guys running around. You don’t know where they are,” Ross said. “I have a house with a big cellar and a big garage. I cleared the house. I had firearm protection.”
Authorities on Friday said that two men fitting the description of Sweat and Matt had been seen a week ago in Steuben County, east of Allegany County.
Sweat, 35, was serving a life sentence without parole for killing a sheriff’s deputy. Matt, 48, was doing 25 years to life for the 1997 kidnap, torture and hacksaw dismemberment of his former boss.
Prison worker Joyce Mitchell on Saturday remained in custody on charges she helped the two men escape by providing them hacksaw blades, chisels and other tools. She has pleaded not guilty.
Officials said that a corrections officer also has been placed on administrative leave as part of the investigation into the men’s escape.
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