A nearly week-long manhunt for a killer who escaped from an Ohio prison ended Sunday. When authorities confirmed a body floating. In the Kentucky River was likely the killer’s.
“Today I believe we have closed our five-day manhunt,” Henderson. Kentucky Police Chief Sean McKinney said at a news conference.
Earlier Sunday, a boater reported a body in the Ohio River. Which shares Kentucky’s northern border with Indiana and Ohio, McKinney said. After it was recovere, a preliminary investigation determine it was Bradley Gillespie. 50, who was last seen on the banks of the waterway, he said.
The convict was last seen Monday at the Allen-Oakwood. Correctional Institution in Lima, Ohio, authorities said. The next morning he and fellow inmate James Lee, 47. Were determine to be missing after a prisoner count, they said.
Investigators say the two hid in a dumpster as part of their escape. Henderson is about 350 miles southwest of Lima. Authorities said the couple was seen at a Home Depot in nearby Evansville, Indiana. And also in the small town of Vincennes, Indiana. Where they may have tried unsuccessfully to break into a car.
On Wednesday, police said, Gillespie and Lee were believe to be inside. An allegedly stolen vehicle that Henderson officers chased. In the area until it crashed and the suspects fled. Lee was capture nearby, but Gillespie apparently escaped and remaine.
After the car chase, authorities swarmed the Henderson area with dozens of officers. Three helicopters and bloodhounds. But on Sunday, McKinney suggested that Gillespie may have drowned days earlier. With his body remaining on the riverbed as of the weekend.
“The level or stage of decomposition is consistent. With a body being in water for four to five days,” McKinney said.
Gillespie was convict of two murders and was serving. Two consecutive 15-to-life sentences after being sentence in 2016, Ohio authorities said. Lee has been convicte of burglary and other theft-related offenses, they said.
Four Department of Corrections employees were place. On paid administrative leave amid an internal and Ohio. State Highway Patrol investigation into the jailbreak.