Did this woman help spring ‘Shawshank Two’?
THE female prison worker suspected of helping two inmates stage a Shawshank Redemption-style escape has been named as Joyce Mitchell.
The married 51-year-old is being questioned over the disappearance of murderers Richard Matt and David Sweat from the Clinton Correctional Facility in the state of New York, where she works as a training supervisor.
Investigators have also spoken to her husband Lyle and have gone through their rubbish to establish if Mrs Mitchell was in a relationship with one of the prisoners.
A source told the New York Post that 48-year-old Matt was the more likely of the two as he ‘has a way with the ladies’. Matt and Sweat, 34, cut through their cell walls with power tools and crawled through the sewer system, emerging from a manhole beyond the prison grounds. Their escape on Saturday has been likened to the one in the 1994 hit film.
The maximum security prison is undergoing construction work and it appears guards did not check how many tools the contractors brought in and out each day.
One possibility being investigated is that Matt and Sweat timed their own work with the scheduled construc- tion so that it disguised the noise. The escapees also worked on the jail’s ‘honour wing’ due to their good behaviour, where perks included getting to work as assistants to prison contractors such as plumbers.
Sweat was serving life without parole for killing a county sheriff’s deputy in 2002, while Matt had been sentenced to 25 years to life for kidnapping, killing and dismembering a man in 1997.