The search for an escaped inmate, Johnathan Mabe, concluded after officers employed a drone to locate and apprehend him near Sanford Correctional Center in Lee County, as reported by CBS17. Mabe, characterized by officials as having a lengthy criminal background, made his escape yesterday and was found in a wooded area not far from the minimum-security institution.
Mabe's escape, which instigated a manhunt that lasted several hours, saw him scaling a fence during the afternoon, triggering an area search which included the temporary soft lockdown of three nearby schools and prompted statements of disbelief and concern from community members, according to a WRAL News report, where a student expressed it "didn't feel real" and a parent cited the proximity to the school as "still alarming" despite being thankful the escapee had not been on school grounds.
With a history of convictions primarily for drug offenses, forgery, and larceny, Mabe had been recommitted to the Sanford facility on September 4 to serve a four-year term as a habitual felon, as per the North Carolina Department of Adult Corrections; his record of criminal activity dates back to 2020 with various offenses, detailed by WRAL News.
The North Carolina Department of Adult Corrections now holds Mabe at Central Prison in Raleigh, where he is facing additional charges related to his escape, the nature of these charges remains unspoken yet they are an inevitable consequence of his flight from lawful detention wherein the collective efforts of local law enforcement and correctional protocols found their test and their validation in the nocturnal hours where the fugitive, found amongst the trees, would fall once more into the hands of justice as was originally intended by the punitive sentence following his errancies of the past, as chronicled by Spectrum News.
Information released by officials described Mabe, 40, as a white male approximately 6 feet tall and 200 pounds, with black hair and brown eyes; his known ties to the Sanford community likely influenced the immediate search radius, contributing to his timely capture and this detail circulated as part of a broader call for public vigilance during the search, detailed by Spectrum News.
