Michael A. Tweedel |
Police seek Michael A. Tweedel and Johnny Mack Brown
The Associated Press
TRION, Ga. Authorities warned residents in northwest Georgia to be on the lookout for two prison state escapees, including one serving a life sentence for armed robbery, hijacking a vehicle and aggravated assault and battery in Clarke County.
The Department of Corrections said Johnny M. Brown, 53, and Michael A. Tweedel, 48, who was serving two 10-year sentences for armed robbery in Cobb County, escaped from Hays State Prison near Trion on Monday morning.
Corrections officials said they, along with the Georgia State Patrol and local authorities, were concentrating their search around Spring Creek in the northwestern section of Chattooga County.
Johnny Mack Brown |
They said dogs found several tracks that make them believe the two were still in the area of the prison. They warned residents to exercise caution, lock cars and homes, secure weapons and avoid isolated areas.
Brown shot an armored car guard three times in the chest and fired at others during a Dec. 22, 1997 armed robbery at a former Wal-Mart in a shopping center west of Athens. He stole $183,000 in cash and checks and got away in a hijacked car.
Police arrested Brown soon after at a nearby mall.
He escaped from Clarke County Jail in September 1998 by lifting the bottom of a recreation gate and scaling a wall.
During his three weeks on the run he accumulated criminal charges in three states, including an allegation that he beat an 84-year-old man with a barbell in South Carolina and stole his car, then stole another car from a dealership in North Carolina.
Authorities arrested Brown in Daytona Beach, Fla., when they found him asleep in the car he stole from the dealership.