EXCLUSIVE DETAILS: Pennsylvania State Police announced an update in the interstate manhunt for escaped murder suspect Michael Burham, who slipped out of the Warren County jail Thursday night and was believed to have run off into the forests along the border of Pennsylvania and New York.
Burham, an Army veteran with survivalist and firearms training, was being held on kidnapping and related charges and is also suspected of murder and rape in New York in an interstate crime spree that ended in his arrest in South Carolina after a previous manhunt in May.
He made his way though the jail's gym to the rooftop, where he was able to climb down with a rope mad from bedsheets, according to authorities. Then he snuck off in a denim jacket and jail issued orange-striped jumpsuit and matching Crocs, police said. But he may have changed his clothes along the way.
The announcement is a quick reversal from earlier Monday, when authorities said they had no plans to hold a news briefing.
MANHUNT LAUNCHED AFTER MURDER SUSPECT WHO WROTE HE'S 'NOT SORRY' ESCAPES PENNSYLVANIA JAIL
Michael Burham is accused of shooting Kala Hodgkin to death in New York before lighting another womans care on fire and then kidnapping a Pennsylvania couple, according to police. He escaped custody Thursday night, prompting a new manhunt. (Cattaraugus County Sheriffs Office, Kala Hodgkin/Facebook)
"The official stance of the Pennsylvania State Police is currently there is no new information to share, and no press conference is scheduled," a spokesman said earlier Monday afternoon.
Police have been on his trail since early Friday and previously told Fox News that they'd uncovered a series of possible campsites in the area and did not believe the suspect had traveled far.
"We have located some small stockpiles or campsites in wooded areas in the general vicinity of Warren," Pennsylvania State Police Lt. Col. George Bivens said Sunday. "It supports what we’ve said all along, that he’s prepared as a survivalist in the past and tried to be ready, if you will, to spend time in the woods."
This booking photo provided by the Warren, Pa., City Police Department shows Michael Burham. Authorities searching for the inmate described by police as "very dangerous" used bedsheets to escape from a northwestern Pennsylvania jail on Thursday, July 6, 2023. Burham was a suspect in a homicide investigation and was being held on $1 million bail on kidnapping, burglary and other charges, authorities said. (Warren City Police Department via AP)
The suspect has numerous relatives in the area and could have been getting outside assistance as well, Bivens said.
U.S. Marshals joined the manhunt Saturday, announcing a reward of up to $9,500 for information leading to his capture.
Burham spent more than 11 years in the Army Reserve as a water treatment specialist and utilities equipment repairer, from February 2008 to December 2020, Fox News has learned.
He was never deployed and was a sergeant at the end of his service, according to the Army.
MANHUNT FOR ESCAPED PENNSYLVANIA JAIL INMATE, MURDER SUSPECT CONTINUES
But in May, he was suspected in a shocking crime spree that involved the shooting death of a New York woman he had been separately accused of raping and the abduction of a Pennsylvania couple who were later found in South Carolina.
Burham is accused of a sexual assault in Jamestown, New York, and the kidnapping of an elderly couple in Pennsylvania, whom he allegedly drove to South Carolina before releasing them, unharmed, the FBI said. (FBI)
Police said they considered Burham armed and dangerous.
Jamestown police found Kala Hodgkin, 34, shot dead in her home early on May 11, according to federal court filings. She had three children, ages 8, 11 and 14, according to a GoFundMe campaign set up by friends and family.
That same day, Burham was allegedly recorded on his ex-girlfriend's Ring doorbell camera trying to break into her house and lighting her car on fire.
He is believed to have crossed state lines into Pennsylvania, where the couple was reported missing along with their car on May 20.
Pennsylvania police sent out a missing persons alert, and South Carolina Highway Patrol found the victims alive the following day in North Charleston.
They told police they had been taken at gunpoint from their home and identified Burham as their alleged kidnapper, according to authorities.
Burham was arrested on May 22 after police tracked him to South Carolina, where they found a note to his father in a stolen car.
"I'm not sorry for what I did, however I do feel terrible about the children," the note reads, according to court filings.