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| Helena prisoner escapes result in suspension of transport company |
| By The Missoulian |
| Published: 09/13/2004 |
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A private inmate transport company from Tennessee has been suspended from moving Montana prisoners as officials investigate the escape of two convicted murderers from a transport van stopped at a fast-food restaurant two weeks ago. In all, four inmates - three of them convicted killers - escaped from the van, operated by TransCor, a subsidiary of Corrections Corporation of America, the nation's largest private corrections company which operates the private prison in Shelby. The breakout occurred Sept. 2 as the van was idling in a Burger King parking lot near the Capitol for a dinner break. Two convicts were caught shortly after the escape. Two others, killers Russell VanKirk and Leonard Brown, remained on the lam for several hours, prompting an all-out manhunt through a normally quiet neighborhood that lasted until after 1 a.m. Corrections Director Bill Slaughter said he temporarily suspended TransCor's 4-month-old contract as his agency and others try to answer a number of questions: How did the inmates slip out of their shackles and handcuffs before the breakout? How did they rip the wire mesh covering the back windows of the van and break the glass? Where was the guard who was supposed to be watching the van as her partner went into Burger King? Why didn't agents use the drive-through? "I don't know that I've ever seen a more potentially dangerous situation," Slaughter said. "We took this deadly serious." |
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