A manhunt is underway in the Ozark Mountains after Grant Hardin, a former Arkansas police chief and convicted murderer, escaped prison by impersonating a corrections officer.
Hardin, once the police chief of Gateway, Arkansas, had been serving combined 80-year sentences for murder and rape when he walked out of the North Central Unit Sunday afternoon dressed like a guard.
The prison, known as Calico Rock, is a medium-security facility tucked into the rugged terrain of northern Arkansas.
A broken system and a community on edge
Cheryl Tillman, whose brother James Appleton was shot and killed by Hardin in 2017, said the escape has shaken her family and others who lived through the trials.
“We were there at his trial when all that went down, and he seen us there, he knows,” she told the Associated Press. “He’s just an evil man. He is no good for society.”
Hardin became known as the “Devil in the Ozarks” for the brutality of his crimes, which were also the subject of a 2023 documentary.
He pleaded guilty to first-degree murder after shooting Appleton, a local water department worker, in the head and leaving his body inside a car. He was also convicted of the 1997 rape of an elementary school teacher.
Now, authorities are scrambling to locate a man many consider extremely dangerous.
Escaped through a secure gate
Prison officials say Hardin escaped around 2:55 p.m. Sunday, and they didn’t notify the public until about two hours later. A court document says he tricked an officer into opening a secure gate by impersonating a guard, wearing clothes not consistent with standard inmate or correctional uniforms.
“There’s nothing inside the prison that looks like that,” said Rand Champion, spokesperson for the Arkansas Department of Corrections. “So that’s one of the challenges we’re going through to find out what that was and how he was able to get that or manufacture it.”
Questions are already mounting about why a man convicted of such violent crimes was housed in a medium-security facility. Champion defended the placement, citing “assessments” and the “needs of different facilities and inmates.”
Survivors retraumatized after killer ex-police chief escapes Arkansas prison
Bryan Sexton, who prosecuted Hardin, said his office has been contacting witnesses and victims’ families. “To have to be the one who picks up the phone and reminds them of what has happened to them is something that weighs heavily on me,” he said.
Search teams, including drones, helicopters, and canines, are combing through the rugged terrain of Izard County, where the prison is located. Rain and topography have made the operation difficult, though law enforcement says the region’s rural nature may also help in identifying the escapee.
“In more rural areas, most people know one another,” said Craig Caine, a retired U.S. Marshal. “In that aspect, it could be detrimental to him.”
“He knows where the caves are.”
Locals say Hardin is a survivor. In Pea Ridge, café owner Darla Nix said her sons grew up around Hardin and knew him as quiet and intelligent.
“He knows where the caves are. He’s just a survivor. He knows how to make it,” she said. “They’re going to have their hands full trying to catch him.”
Hardin’s escape comes just days after 10 men fled a New Orleans jail through a hole behind a toilet, raising broader questions about institutional security failures and oversight in U.S. detention facilities.
Residents in nearby counties have been urged to lock doors, stay alert, and report anything suspicious. The public is being asked to call 911 with any credible sightings.
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