CLEARFIELD – A recent county prison escape topped the agenda of Tuesday’s Clearfield County Prison Board meeting.
Around 1 p.m. May 30, authorities say inmate Craig Steven Hauke-Miller, 36, of Lemont escaped from Clearfield County Jail.
Court documents indicate around 30 inmates were in the west recreational yard and many were a witness but did not alert staff.
At the next inmate count, it was reportedly recognized that the count was off, and there was a missing inmate.
This placed the jail into lockdown, and its protocols for emergency situations were implemented.
The prison escape was reported to the Clearfield Regional Police Department that afternoon around 3:37 p.m.
The affidavit notes Hauke-Miller has an “extensive criminal history” including many violent crimes, demonstrated escapes, pursuits and other “high-risk behaviors.”
Hauke-Miller was successfully captured within a matter of hours at 8:28 p.m. May 30 at the Royal Inn motel in Clearfield, according to a previously-published article.
This required a “major response of public safety resources” including a state police aircraft and other “specialty assets,” the affidavit states.
Tuesday Warden David Gallagher reported jail staff have spent recent weeks identifying facility vulnerabilities and taking “after-action” measures so it’s more difficult for inmates to exploit them in the future.
While the jail is no longer on lockdown, he did say it’s been operating with “modified movement” and he expects normal operations to resume very soon.
The board also discussed how to improve its response and public notification of a prison escape or other jail emergency.
Gallagher said they had a “one-call” system at his last facility that sent out mass notifications of events to subscribers in the community.
District Attorney Ryan Sayers said Clearfield County 911 and the Department of Emergency Services began looking for a countywide notification system for law enforcement following a manhunt a few years ago.
“I assume there’s some type of program that allows members of the public to sign up as well,” Sayers said, and it shouldn’t be too difficult to put into place.
However, he did want local police included in future discussions because there’s also a need for protocol so public notification doesn’t compromise an active investigation.
But we absolutely—150 percent—do need a few critical details out there, Sayers said, like inmate name, physical description, time of incident, etc.
At that point, Sheriff Mike Churner indicated he wasn’t even notified and only learned of the May 30 escape via a call from the county commissioners three hours after the fact.
“And my guys deal with these inmates every day. They know the inmates—they know what they do, probably even how they think so I’m very disappointed with the whole process.”
Though he was under the impression notifications were being made to the appropriate authorities, Gallagher admitted he wasn’t entirely sure who was being notified and immediately felt their jail emergency response protocols were in need of work.
Such protocols for notifying police, Prison Board and the public should be fairly easy to implement through the existing county 911/Emergency Services network, pointed out Commissioner Dave Glass.
“It’s a big countywide situation,” he said, “… so it’s appropriate for them to be involved.”
Sayers agreed, adding it wasn’t the first one either as the county’s had a manhunt and two prison escapes in recent years, and it needs to work on its interdepartmental and interagency communication.
In all three of those situations, he said he personally found out either because someone heard it on the scanner and sent him a text message, or because someone called him three hours later.
There are some people who just need to know more up the line, not down the line, Sayers said, which should be part of the protocol.
Following discussion, the board agreed to schedule an initial meeting on the matter with 911/Emergency Services and the warden before the next Prison Board meeting on July 18.
“I actually think we might already have the tools,” Glass said. “We just haven’t locked into everything yet.
“It’s fair to say the board will know more next month.”
