Update on convicted quadruple killer Norman Johnston,who escaped max.sec.prison a few days ago & remains at large,interesting details on exactly how he carried out escape
Joe1orbit
Okay folks, this will have to be my FINAL post of the morning, most likely my
final post of the entire day and night. Wish I had more time, but I don't,
sadly.
Not much of a breaking news story here, but I did want to update the case of
Norman Johnston, the convicted QUADRUPLE murderer who successfully escaped from
prison a few days ago. It is ALWAYS impressive when a MULTIPLE killer manages
to successfully flee from prison, especially AFTER his conviction. It was a
MAXIMUM security torture chamber that Norman escaped from. Good job! Below we
get details on just how CLEVER and DETERMINED Norman was, and his intelligence,
to fashion and place a REALISTIC looking dummy inside of his prison bed, is
really the KEY, that allowed him to have enough TIME to carry out this escape.
I wonder if he had OUTSIDE help?? And ya gotta give Norman even MORE credit,
for having apparently made his way FROM the prison. The FURTHER away he can
get, the better his chances of remaining free are. He has already been on the
loose for 72 hours, at a minimum.
In the below update we learn how LOTS of people in the town where Norman used
to live, and other folks who have known him, are now quaking in their shoes,
worried that Norman might go after them. Certainly that is a possibility.
Norman might REALIZE that he CANNOT reasonably expect to remain a fugitive
forever, and maybe he escaped solely for the purpose of WANTING to KILL more
people?? Unlikely, not not impossible.
At age 48, Norman is still young enough to live a fugitive lifestyle, as long
as his health is good. His years also might be an advantage in terms of making
Norman more THOUGHTFUL, less rash and impulsive, in terms of his movements and
hiding out.
Police say that a few claimed sightings of Norman have been called in by area
residents, but there were no MAJOR leads on exactly where Norman might be
heading, at least not as of the writing of this AP wire report.
I think Norman's best bet is to try to LEAVE the state of PA, get as far away
as he can, maybe even try to slip over the border into Canada or Mexico. The
police manhunt WILL be quite intense, given the quadruple murder status that
Norman has achieved, but in time, if only he can hold out & hide out long
enough, it will die down a bit, and IF Norman is far enough away from PA, he
could start a new, underground life for himself. Good luck, Norman!
Take care, JOE
The following appears courtesy of today's Associated Press news wire:
Man Convicted in 4 Murders Escapes
By JENNIFER BROWN
KENNETT SQUARE, Pa. (AP) - There are jangled nerves in the hometown of Norman
Johnston, a convicted murderer who opened the window of his cell this week and
slipped away from a maximum-security prison.
``I wouldn't be surprised to see him on my doorstep,'' said Janice Slicer, who
manages the apartment complex where Johnston last lived. ``It's a weird feeling
that he's out.''
Johnston, 48, escaped early Monday from a state prison in Huntingdon, a western
Pennsylvania community some 200 miles from Kennett Square, just outside
Philadelphia.
State police have received a handful of possible sightings since then. While
authorities say they have no solid information that Johnston is back in town,
his former wife reportedly left the area when she heard of the escape.
Since 1980, Johnston and his two older brothers, Bruce Sr. and David, have been
serving life terms for killing four teen-age boys in the late 1970s to cover up
a family burglary ring. The film ``At Close Range,'' starring Sean Penn, was
based on the case.
Bruce Johnston Sr. also was convicted of killing his son's girlfriend and
trying to kill his son, Bruce Jr., who later gave incriminating testimony
against his father and uncles.
Authorities in Chester County have alerted dozens of residents about the
escape. Some of Norman Johnston's relatives still live in the area, including
Bruce Jr., who left the federal witness protection program years ago.
Norman Johnston has ``shown in the past that he's willing to kill to protect
himself and his family,'' said Joe Carroll, the Chester County prosecutor who
won convictions against the brothers. ``It just depends on what he has planned
- whether he's out for retaliation, or just wants to stay free.''
The burglary ring included more than 40 people and operated for nearly 20
years. The gang was responsible for stealing hundreds of trucks, cars and farm
equipment in Delaware, Maryland and Pennsylvania. At least 25 other people were
convicted of burglary and fencing charges until the gang's 1987 demise.
The Johnston brothers have continued to appeal their murder convictions, and
Norman Johnston was to have a hearing in about two months.
``We don't expect him to show up,'' Carroll said.
AP-NY-08-05-99
--------------------------------------------------------
The following appears courtesy of the 8/5/99 online edition of The
Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper:
Escaped-convict sighting reports lead to no clues
Police received many calls about Norman Johnston. More jailbreak details were
revealed.
By Rena Singer
and Ralph Vigoda
INQUIRER STAFF WRITERS
09/05/99
Numerous possible sightings of escaped killer Norman Johnston -- including one
in an Oxford diner -- were called in to police across Pennsylvania and
elsewhere yesterday, but none provided clues to the murderer's whereabouts
three days after he disappeared.
"There have been sightings in central Pennsylvania, in the eastern part of the
state, and some out of state," said State Police Lt. David White. "We followed
up on all of those and could find nothing significant."
Neither Johnston nor the unusual 1966 olive Land Rover that was stolen after
his escape early Monday from the State Correctional Institution in Huntingdon
has been spotted by law enforcement personnel.
A Department of Corrections official yesterday provided more details on how
Johnston was able to fool guards by using a dummy in his bed, then elude them
and pass through two fences surrounding the facility.
Johnston was last seen at 1 a.m. and reported missing at 10 a.m. Because the
day shift reports to the prison at 6 and the Land Rover was reported stolen
between 5 and 6 in the morning, authorities believe Johnston escaped between 1
and 6 a.m.
Department Secretary Martin F. Horn said that Johnston had been in the cell
from which he escaped for only a few weeks, and that the cell had been searched
at the end of June. "He didn't do this overnight," he said.
Since Johnston's picture has appeared in the media and on the State Police Web
site --
www.state.pa.us -- calls have been received by local and state police about
sightings of men fitting Johnston's description.
A waitress at the Oxford Diner told police that a nervous-looking man came in
just before closing around 8 p.m. Monday and ordered a milk shake to go. Oxford
Police Chief Paul Stolz said yesterday morning that a local resident called to
say Johnston might have been walking through the center of town.
"We checked, did not see anything, and relayed the information to state
police," Stolz said. "Would he be that dumb? I just can't picture him walking
in. But you never know what a person might do."
Johnston and his two brothers, Bruce and David, were convicted of the 1978
murders of three teenagers who were junior members of their burglary ring and
who the brothers feared would cooperate with police. They were also found
guilty of the murder of Robin Miller, 15, a girlfriend of Bruce Johnston's son.
Bruce Johnston was also convicted of the murder of another teenage member of
his gang, and of a man killed in 1977 who gave information to police about car
thefts he committed with Bruce Johnston.
All three brothers received consecutive life sentences.
Security for Bruce (in Graterford Prison) and David (in the State Correctional
Institution at Greene) has been increased, Horn said. Authorities said that
they have found no evidence that his brothers either knew about his escape or
were planning their own escapes.
Norman Johnston's escape was possible because he left a dummy tucked into his
bed, so lifelike it aroused no suspicions.
"He used the stuffing from his pillow for the head and covered it with hair he
had been able to obtain," Horn said. "He sewed tissue paper into a T-shirt for
the torso and used brown paper bags for the legs. He assembled the dummy in the
fetal position, allowing the head and one leg to stick out from under a
blanket, so a guard at night, shining a flashlight, would see a brown leg and a
head full of hair and think everything was OK. It was all made from things
available in the cell."
Johnston managed to remove a two-inch steel bar and thick metal mesh covering
the window of his first-floor cell, squeeze through, and drop into a small
exercise pen. Moving through a grassy yard where there is a blind spot for
patrolling guards, he cut first through a 14-foot high chain-link fence and
then through another fence 10 feet beyond the first.
Horn would not describe the specific tools Johnston used.
"Johnston didn't have much," he said. "He had very tiny instruments. His cell
had been searched. He had no extraordinary tools."
Horn added that armed guards have been posted in the blind spot.
Johnston was moved recently to an area of the prison that restricted prisoners
to their cells 23 hours a day. Prison officials searched his former cells for
security breaches, Horn said, but would not reveal what those searches
uncovered.
Johnston's belongings were last examined on July 30 -- two days before the
breakout -- during a routine security search. His cell was last searched the
last week in June. Horn said during that cell search, corrections officers were
supposed to make a "visual inspection of all security equipment and bang on the
bar and the mesh to make sure they haven't been compromised."
The corrections officers conducting both searches reported nothing unusual.
"Obviously we're very concerned and very upset about this," Horn said. ". . .
We're conducting our own internal investigation and we'll be asking some hard
questions of our staff."
Horn said officials were aware that perimeter security at the prison was not
airtight and that money had been appropriated to take care of the problem.
"We knew we had a problem and were attempting to address it as quickly as
possible," he said. "We're ordering lots of cameras to cover all the blind
spots. We're installing intrusion detection systems along the perimeter. The
bids for the work had already been opened when this escape happened. Work is
scheduled to begin in three weeks."
-------------------------------------------------------
The following two news articles both appear courtesy of the 8/5/99 online
edition of The Philadelphia Daily News newspaper:
Con left paper trail
Sketched map allegedly found in pal's cell
by Julie Knipe Brown
Daily News Staff Writer
08/05/99
A hand-drawn escape map was found in the prison cell of an associate of
murderer Norman Johnston, pointing to the possibility that Johnston's elaborate
predawn escape Monday from a maximum-security state prison was part of a wider
conspiracy, sources said yesterday.
Johnston, a quadruple murderer with a history of escape attempts and
disciplinary problems, remained at large yesterday, while law-enforcement
officers across the state and the region followed up on numerous possible
sightings, all without success.
As state prison officials resumed their probe into Johnston's escape from
Huntingdon state prison, word began to leak out that authorities had seized
either a map or some sort of sketch in a search of the cell of Ancell E. Hamm,
a convicted cop-killer serving time at Huntingdon. Hamm was once part of the
murderous burglary ring that included Norman Johnston and his two killer
brothers.
State correction officials declined to discuss what evidence, if any, has been
discovered, but Hamm, serving life for killing two Kennett Square police
officers in 1972, has been placed in maximum security.
Johnston's brothers, Bruce Sr., at Graterford state prison, and David, at
Greene state prison, also were put into maximum security at those institutions.
When asked why Hamm had been placed in solitary confinement, Diana Baney,
spokeswoman for Huntingdon state prison, said "It's part of the investigation."
Prison officials have known for years that Johnston and his brothers are
capable at least of planning intricate escapes.
In 1979, while awaiting trial in Chester County, the brothers were found to be
planning a mass escape involving smuggled hacksaws. They used a fellow gang
member to fly a small airplane over the county prison to take pictures of the
prison's layout and the surrounding countryside.
The plan was thwarted, but not before prison officials discovered one of the
Johnstons' nephews on the prison grounds overlooking the entrance, possibly
scoping out the prison guards' routines.
A witness testified at the time that Bruce Johnston told him someone on the
outside would throw an automatic rifle and several handguns over the fence and
then cut an escape route in the fence for the brothers and other inmates
involved.
Huntingdon District Attorney Robert Stewart declined to confirm if a map was
found, but said it's quite possible that Hamm may have been involved.
"Ancell Hamm was known to be an associate of the Johnstons, so it's possible,"
said Stewart, a former assistant district attorney in Chester County who is
well acquainted with the Johnstons. Stewart said he would oversee any
prosecutions as a result of the escape, but for now, most law enforcement
officials were focusing most of their efforts on capturing Johnston, rather
than investigating the escape.
Another law-enforcement source said he was told the map was found in Hamm's
cell as much as five months ago.
Johnston left a lifelike dummy trimmed with human hair in his cell bed to fool
guards into believing he was present during the early morning prison counts.
Sometime after the 1 a.m. head count, Johnston used a cutting tool to remove a
bar to his cell window, then squeezed out the one-foot-by-three-foot opening
and landed outside in a small exercise pen, surrounded by a 14-foot-high
chainlink fence topped with razor wire, officials said.
He then cut through the fence, crept past four guard towers and cut through
another fence before vanishing into the rural central Pennsylvania countryside.
Authorities believe he stole a 1966 Land Rover from a residence near the prison
and then made his getaway at least 10 hours before officials even realized he
was missing.
"They are supposed to make checks periodically. There should have been a time,
in my opinion, when the guards should have been suspicious, but this of course,
is from 20-20 hindsight," said Stewart.
Martin Horn, secretary of the state department of corrections, called Johnston
"a nuisance prisoner" who had been confined to a maximum security cell that
inmates often refer to as "the hole" because he had been caught selling
marijuana.
The unit holds 128 beds, and most of them were full at the time of the escape,
Horn said. Prisoners in the unit are permitted only one hour of recreational
activity a day, three showers a week and limited personal belongings.
Johnston has not had a visitor or a phone call since April 1998, Horn said.
Horn said Huntingdon has recently upgraded its security, and they've not had an
escape from inside the prison since 1989. "This is a very sophisticated escape,
there are a lot of questions that have yet to be answered," Horn said.
Hamm has been working for years to get himself out of jail. He has filed
numerous post-trial conviction petitions and more than a dozen federal
petitions, but has consistently failed to win a new trial.
Johnston, 48, of Kennett Square, was convicted in March 1980, along with his
brothers, of killing four teen-agers to cover up a multi-million-dollar
burglary ring. The crimes were the subject of the 1986 film "At Close Range,"
starring Sean Penn and Christopher Walken.
The FBI also joined the search yesterday, but it may be some time before
Johnston is added to the agency's most wanted list, said spokeswoman Linda
Vizi. "That would come down the road, but he's just the type of person this
list was invented for," she said.
Staff Writer Gloria Campisi contributed to this report.
------------------------------------------------------------
Residents recall Johnston gang era
By Adrienne Lu
INQUIRER SUBURBAN STAFF
08/05/99
Back in Norman Johnston's day, teen-agers would race their hot rods from the
Pennsylvania House family diner on Old Baltimore Pike in Kennett Square up to
the Sons of Italy House.
And where farms once dominated the landscape, new developments have sprung up,
bringing with them suburbanites and their giant supermarkets.
Since the 1970s, when Johnston and some of his family members ran their theft
ring of farm equipment, tractors and cars, much has changed in southern Chester
County.
But many remain who remember the Johnston Gang, who sprang back into the news
when Norman Johnston escaped from a state prison early Monday.
"They were -- how can I describe them? You don't want to use the term hoodlum,
but they were rough customers," Kennett Square Mayor Leon Spencer said
yesterday. "They were pretty rough-hewn people. You just didn't mess with
them."
The Johnstons drove Corvettes, Spencer said, and they used to race them on Old
Baltimore Pike, like all the younger people back then.
"I think it was just we were teenagers . . . this whole hot rod thing, it was
just a part of the time," said Spencer, 49. "Kids went to the soda fountains
and got sodas, drove hot cars."
But times have changed in Chester County. And small-town life in some of
Johnston's old haunts -- Kennett Square, West Grove, New Garden, Chadds Ford --
isn't what it used to be.
From 1980 to March of this year, for example, the number of single-family homes
in Chester County increased from 80,350 to 126,872, or nearly 58 percent,
according to U.S. Census estimates.
The businesses in southern Chester County's downtowns have changed too. Office
complexes, flower shops and restaurants replaced mom and pop stores, hobby
shops and hardware stores.
One Kennett Square regular who hasn't moved is Jim Landerth, who has cut hair
for 33 years from Jim's Barber Shop on South Union Street. Landerth said he cut
all six Johnston brothers' hair for four or five years before they got into
trouble.
"You wouldn't know them from any other kids," Landerth said. The only
difference he noticed was that the Johnstons always seemed to have money. When
Landerth first heard the news of the Johnstons getting arrested, he found it
hard to believe, he said.
"Very nice boys," he said. "Same as anybody else. They were always very nice,
very friendly."
Rea Redifer, 65, a writer and artist from Chadds Ford, recalled seeing the
Johnston brothers and their father from time to time at local restaurants like
Hank's Place.
"I'd just meet 'em on occassion in passing," said Redifer.
Back then, he said, Chadds Ford was somewhat economically depressed. Before
long, though, the real estate market discovered the rural charm of the area,
and luxury homes selling for hundreds of thousands replaced dairy and beef
farms.
The news of the escape, however, meant little to some of the area's newer and
younger residents.
"Never heard of them" said Strato Moriello, 34, who moved to Kennett Square six
years ago.
Jon Smith, 30, grew up in the area, but was too young to remember the Johnston
gang. "I don't think anybody has heard about it," he said.
And John DiMatteo, 27, said he only knew of the Johnstons from the 1986 Sean
Penn movie, "At Close Range." He decided to watch the movie a few years ago
while he was working as a bartender at Mendenhall Inn, after customers bugged
him with questions about the Johnstons.
"I saw the movie," DiMatteo said. "It was all right. It was filmed right there
in Oxford. It was kind of cool to see the area on film."
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