Cold Causes Escaped Inmate in Kentucky to Surrender
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allanswart/Thinkstock(LEXINGTON, Ky.) — An inmate who escaped Kentucky’s Blackburn Correctional Complex on Sunday had a change of heart after spending a night in the frigid cold that’s gripped much of the nation.
According to the Los Angeles Times, 42-year-old Robert Vick showed up on the doorstep of the Sunset Motel in Lexington Monday morning, and had one thing to say to 61-year-old manager Maurice King.
“He said, ‘Call the law on me,'” King told the paper. “…I’m the one who escaped from Blackburn.'”
King recalled, “He said, ‘I’ve got to turn myself in, I’m froze to death.”
King says he gave Vick some water and a chance to warm up while he called the cops. At first, the authorities didn’t believe his story — a follow-up call in which Vick gave his prisoner number got cops to show up and take him into custody.
Vick, who was serving a six-year sentence for burglary and criminal possession of a forged document, was actually up for parole in March.
Vick told King he’d spent the night in an abandoned farmhouse not far from the prison, but the 18-degree below zero weather froze his taste for freedom.
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