Feel good story of the day…
Two escaped inmates sought in the killings of two guards on a Georgia prison bus were captured after a chase and being held at gunpoint by a rural Tennessee homeowner whose vehicle they were trying to steal, authorities said.
Donnie Rowe, 43, and Ricky Dubose, 24, were apprehended Thursday in the rural community of Christiana, Tennessee, ending a multi-state manhunt that began Tuesday morning.
‘True bravery is what’s caused us to stand before you tonight to talk about a successful capture instead of a tragic incident,’ Tennessee Bureau of Investigation Director Mark Gwyn said at a news conference. ‘So I’m totally grateful to everyone involved.’
Earlier in the day, police in nearby Shelbyville had responded to a call about a home invasion, where a couple had been held captive, Georgia Bureau of Investigation spokeswoman Nelly Miles said.
The suspects fled in the couple’s vehicle and fired on sheriff’s deputies chasing them on Interstate 24 about 50 miles southeast of Nashville, Tennessee, Highway Patrol spokesman Lt. Bill Miller said. Rutherford County Sheriff Michael Fitzhugh said his deputies did not return fire and none of them was injured.
Rowe and Dubose crashed the car and bailed out, running into the woods, Miller said. They then came across a home set back on a long driveway.
The trooper said the homeowner looked outside and saw the two allegedly trying to steal his car. The man held the two at gunpoint with a neighbor he called for help until the sheriff’s department could get there to arrest the fugitives.
The two were being held at the Rutherford County jail.
Georgia Department of Corrections Commissioner Greg Dozier said in a news release that he was relieved the two inmates were captured and no longer a threat to the public.
The two men had been on the run since early Tuesday, when they are accused of having killed Sgt. Christopher Monica and Sgt. Curtis Billue.
Watch:
The two inmates overpowered and disarmed the guards on a bus about 6:45 a.m. Tuesday as 33 inmates were being driven between prisons, authorities have said. One of them fatally shot both guards, and then they jumped out of the bus and carjacked a driver who happened to pull up behind them on state Highway 16 in Putnam County, southeast of Atlanta, authorities said.
The two inmates then fled in the stolen Honda Civic and drove about 25 miles north to Madison, where they ransacked a home, stealing food and clothes and leaving their prison uniforms behind around 10:30 a.m. Tuesday.
Late Tuesday night, about 12 hours after the home burglary, the pair stole a Ford pickup truck from a rock quarry about 9 miles from the burglarized home when the trail had gone cold.
