By Jeff Lehr
The Joplin Globe
PINEVILLE, Mo. — Two inmates who escaped the McDonald County Jail overnight Sunday are believed to have fled in a van they stole and then abandoned in Arkansas in favor of an SUV and a couple of dirt bikes.
Matthew Miller, 22, of Eagle Rock, and Keith Davis, 24, of Anderson, escaped the jail in Pineville sometime after 6 p.m. Sunday by prying loose a piece of metal in the shower area of a cellblock and slipping through the gap between the metal plate and a cinder block wall into an insecure maintenance area of the jail, according to Sheriff Michael Hall.
The sheriff confirmed that Miller and Davis are the same two inmates who slipped out of the jail Dec. 8 through a utility access area and returned on their own a short time later. Their break from confinement was not discovered on surveillance video until two days after they came back.
Miller and Davis took a different escape route this time, the sheriff said.
The inmates are believed to have swiped a van from Sugar Island Campground outside of Pineville. The van was recovered in Springdale, Arkansas, where a Toyota Land Cruiser and two dirt bikes were reported stolen from a used car lot. Davis had been involved in a theft of motorcycles from the same lot on a prior occasion, according to Hall.
The sheriff thinks the escapees may have returned to McDonald County from Arkansas.
“I may be wrong, but that’s my gut feeling,” Hall said.
Miller has a hearing scheduled today in McDonald County Circuit Court on charges of kidnapping, burglary and tampering with a motor vehicle. He and his older brother, Michael Miller, and his brother’s girlfriend, Amanda Rhodes, were charged with abducting Pamela Walker on Jan. 3, 2014, from her home near Washburn, assaulting her and tossing her down a ravine.
Michael Miller pleaded guilty to the charges in February and received concurrent terms of 18, 15 and seven years in prison. His girlfriend’s case remains pending.
Davis was being held on multiple counts of receiving stolen property and tampering with motor vehicles, and a single felony count of resisting arrest.
Copyright 2016 The Joplin Globe