Malone, NY – Two escapees from an upstate New York prison are believed to be headed for Canada, New York State Police Major Charles Guess said on Friday.
Guess said police have a “high degree of confidence” that the convicted killers who fled nearly three weeks ago from Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, New York, about 20 miles from Canada, are moving north to the border.
The conclusions were based on items found and being tested for DNA, Guess said, but he declined to give further details.
The focus of the search on Day 21 on Friday appeared to be around the town of Malone. A small contingent of New York state troopers is stationed along power lines in the area, and motorists have to pass through a checkpoint.
“I think these guys are going to find them,” said Sonny Morales, as he sat on an easy chair in front of a house near the border.
“I know it’s taken a long time, but there’s a lot of freaking land to cover. The border’s pretty tight.”
Sweat and Matt broke out of the prison in Dannemora on June 6. Authorities say they cut through the steel wall at the back of their cells, crawled down a catwalk, broke through a brick wall, cut their way into and out of a steam pipe and then emerged from a manhole outside the prison.
Sweat, 35, was serving a life sentence without parole in the killing of a sheriff’s deputy. Matt, who turned 49 on Thursday, was doing 25 years to life in the kidnapping, torture and hacksaw dismemberment of his former boss.
