Escaped inmates evaded dogs and drones – but Illinois homeless shelter ends their run

An airplane, drones, police dogs and thermal image technology couldn’t catch two inmates who escaped a Wisconsin prison, officials say.

When they crossed the border into Illinois, a homeless shelter stepped in to help.

James Robert Newman, 37, and Thomas E. Deering, 46, escaped the Columbia Correctional Institution, a maximum-security prison in Portage, on Thursday morning, according to a news release. They scaled the perimeter fences and disappeared, officials said.

A widespread search soon began for the violent felons. Newman was in prison for kidnapping, and Deering was imprisoned on convictions of kidnapping and three charges of sexual assault, records show.

Numerous police agencies got involved in tracking down the prisoners, including the FBI and U.S. Marshals, officials said. They responded to a field where a 911 caller reported seeing two people running near an interstate, where a “massive and thorough search was conducted,” officials said.

Police used an airplane, drones, K-9 units and thermal imagery technology — but they came up empty.

On Friday morning, the two men showed up at Miss Carly’s, a homeless shelter in Rockford, Illinois, police said. The shelter has been feeding people in need three days a week, according to its website.

“We are a lighthouse for the lost,” the shelter says.

But the shelter workers got suspicious. Here’s how the owner described what happened next when they saw the men in prison sweats and thermal shirts with blankets stuffed under their clothing show up to their door asking for food.

“They looked just like the kind of people we want to help....but they weren’t,” the shelter posted on Facebook.

Rockford officers took the two men into custody shortly after a phone call from the shelter without incident, Police Chief Daniel O’Shea said during a news conference on Friday.

“That does take a lot of courage to recognize that somebody there could be dangerous and to step away and make a phone call and say, ‘I think they’re here,’” O’Shea said.

According to the Wisconsin Department of Corrections, movement in the prison was restricted recently due to concerns about spreading coronavirus. However, some “essential functions” still were allowed when the escape happened, officials said.

Authorities say an employee in the prison kitchen helped the inmate escape. Holly Marie Zimdahl, 46, was arrested Thursday night on charges of being party to a crime of escape, according to a news release.

The fugitives got into a vehicle at a Piggly Wiggly supermarket about an hour after they escaped and traveled south, police said.

“I am extremely pleased that the authorities have arrested these two individuals who represented a threat to public safety. I am grateful for the professionalism and hard work of the Rockford Police Department, the Columbia County Sheriff’s Office, the U.S Marshals Office, the FBI and all other law enforcement agencies involved in the safe apprehension of these fugitives,” Kevin A. Carr, department of corrections secretary, said, according to the news release.

The Rockford police chief gave Miss Carly’s a shout-out, too.

“We applaud her and her staff for doing what absolutely needed to be done to make sure these people go back to prison where they belong,” he said.

This story was originally published April 17, 2020 at 3:55 PM with the headline "Escaped inmates evaded dogs and drones – but Illinois homeless shelter ends their run."