Escaped killer from Arizona caught in Airway Heights

A convicted murderer who escaped from a privately run prison in Arizona was captured Tuesday night in Airway Heights.

Roy Townsend, 37, was arrested by the Eastern Washington Joint Fugitive Task Force outside the Bell Motel.

Authorities say Townsend and Kollin Folsom, 24, overpowered a guard Sept. 17 while working on a cleaning crew at the Florence Correctional Center. Then they used ladders to scale razor-wire-topped fencing.

“All I wanted to do was get back to see my family,” Townsend said in a jail interview Wednesday.

He hitchhiked from Arizona to Washington, stopping through Spokane to see two of his sisters, Evelyn Watson and Miriam Sammons, on his way home to the Bremerton area. Police pulled over the women Tuesday and found a motel key that led them to Townsend.

He said Wednesday that he expected to eventually get caught.

“It doesn’t matter,” Townsend said. “I’ve got 66 years. You can do the math. I’m going to die in prison.”

Townsend was convicted of arson, theft and murder in the 1996 shooting of 18-year-old Gerald Harkins, of Shelton, Wash.

Townsend wasn’t scheduled to be released until Sept. 5, 2054.

Townsend will be sent to the Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla until Arizona officials decide whether they want to charge him for assaulting the guard or escape, said Chad Lewis, spokesman for the state Department of Corrections.