A fugitive from justice can become a folk music wedge — or a desperate malefactor whose acts become more terrific the in high spirits the stakes become . Sometimes , they can be both at once . Here , we present five dissimilar cases of manpower who contend to evade the jurisprudence for eld , even decades , before at last face DoJ … or not .
In 1996 , a blow rocked Atlanta ’s Centennial Olympic Park , where thousands of spectators had gathered for a concert following a day of acrobatic events . Over 100 people were injured and two were killed as a final result ( one give way on the scene ; the other , a member of the medium , go of a ticker onset while running to cover the upshot ) . At first , the top defendant wasRichard Jewell , a security guard who ’d helped reset the area after discovering a shady backpack ( stuffed with a 40 - pounding pipage bomb calorimeter , as it turned out ) before the explosion .
But the veridical culprit was Eric Rudolph , whose nonparallel - bombardment career was just getting go at that point . In January 1997 he set off two bombs in an Atlanta suburb , just outside an abortion clinic . In February , he was responsible for an burst at a lesbian nightspot in northeast Atlanta . Both onrush caused legion combat injury . His crimes turned lethal again in January 1998 when he hit another women ’s health clinic where abortions were perform , kill a security department precaution and most killing a nanny .
Based on his targets , his motive was fairly apparent , and it became completely manifest when heissued a statementafter his arrest spelling out his anti - abortion and anti - LGBT view , and express zero remorse for his crimes , all four or which he confess to . But the arrest take away time ; magnificently , Rudolph was n’t charm until May 2003 , after the “ most infamous American fugitive on the FBI ’s ‘ Most want ’ tilt , ” per then - Attorney General John Ashcroft , had been dumpster diving around the fringes of westerly North Carolina for years .
In 2005 , he was sentenced to four sprightliness time plus 120 years .
extra sources : FBI.gov;CNN.com
Of all the fugitives on this list , the least unsafe is likely Washington - born adolescent Colton Harris - Moore , whose nom de crime was “ theBarefoot Bandit . ” The 9th - grade dropout , who’dhad a troubled childhood , did n’t toss off or injure anybody , but he did put plenty at risk of exposure with his joke , which included commit over 100 burglary ( often for food and other supplies to sustain his life-time on the run ) and hot - wiring five planes , all of which he clank - landed . After two age eluding constabulary and exponentially gathering cyberspace fame , the 19 - twelvemonth - previous was captured , armed and aboard a steal speedboat , in the Bahamas in 2010 .
He was sentenced to six and a half years in prison house in 2012 . In 2013 , hereleased a handwritten statementoutlining his hope for the futurity . It record in part :
“ I am act with awing people , and I will have a beautiful life … If there is any truth I ’ve learned , it is that absolutely anything is potential . When this is over and I regain my freedom , I will land everything I am working towards into reality . ”
In 2011 , hesold the movie rights to his life story for $ 1.3 million , with the design of using the money to pay back those he ’d nobble .
Another fugitive with an air travel connection … but George Wright ’s offense caused style more international intrigue than those of the Barefoot Bandit . He was known as “ America ’s most knotty runaway , ” and after 41 years at large , he ’d built an all raw life for himself in his adopted nation of Portugal .
Wright ’s vicious history stretch back to 1962 , when he and a partner robbed a New Jersey gas post ( he wassuspected of earlier armed robberies as well , but this finical criminal offense is what he was nabbed for ) . The station tender was beaten and shoot ( by Wright ’s partner , he maintains ; police never disputed it was the partner ’s weapon that send away ) , and died two days afterwards . Wright was also arrested two days later , and was condemn to 15 - 30 years after plead “ no defense , ” which would grant him to avoid the possibility of the dying penalty . He entered prison house just before his 20th birthday .
In 2012,in an extensive interview withGQ , he reflected on how that one night in 1962 changed him forever .
“ If I had n’t made that option , ” he tell me — the decision to go into the gas station—”I would ’ve had a whole different life . A parallel animation . ”
In 1970 , he escape from prison with a mathematical group of other men , and found his way to Detroit with another escapee . There , he retrieve to GQ :
They often talk over joining the Black Panthers . Highly combat-ready in Detroit , the Panthers seek an end to police force brutality and the release of black inmate from prisons . Wright had grown up in an earned run average of overt racism . He recalls using water natural spring labeled COLORED ONLY and not being allowed to sit on the main floor of a movie theater and , if he postulate to see a white-hot doctor , have to sneak around back and beg to be allowed in . But he could n’t officially unite the Panthers . Nor could any of his housemates . To do so would intend greater examination by the constabulary .
Then someone in the house institute up the idea of Algeria . Eldridge Cleaver , the Black Panthers ’ spokesperson , had recently established an office there . Cleaver had fly to Algeria after jumping bail on assault charges following a shoot - out with Oakland law two days after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.
Thus beganan elaborate schemethat involved a hijacked flight of steps from Detroit to Miami ; a million - dollar ransom to absolve the other passenger ( it was paid , and all were released ) ; a jaunt to Boston to pick up a navigator ; and a stay in Algeria as plan . France was the termination for everyone but Wright .
As the Guardianreports :
The mathematical group finally made their elbow room to France , where Wright ’s associates were tracked down , arrested , try and convict in Paris in 1976 . France refuse to deliver them to the US where they would have face much long judgment of conviction . agree to news reports at the prison term , the defence hailed the light sentences they were give as “ a curse of American racism ” after the jury base “ extenuating fortune ” in their actions , apparently agreeing with the defence ’s statement that the hijacking had been motivated by “ racial oppression in the United States ” .
So , 1976 … but Wright was n’t found until 2011 , after his case moved to top - priority position for a New York - New Jersey fugitive labor forcewas form in 2002 . Where ’d he been for four decades , and how had the escaped murderer and infamous hijacker survived ? The GQ reporter who natter Wright while he was on house arrest in limbo in Portugal — between his arrest and potential extradition to the US — had the same thought :
Before my trip , I ’d expect an FBI federal agent who help orchestrate Wright ’s collar how it was potential for a man to disappear for four decennium . The agent say that Wright was an healthy and connive con artist , probably a compulsive liar , who would not hesitate to practice force or spell or subterfuge to squirm his fashion out of any situation . Perhaps , the agent hinted , he was a psychopath .
In the end , Wright ’s capture was more symbolic than anything else , becausePortugal declined to extradite him . In 2012 , theNew York Timesreported , the US Justice Department decided not to invoke . Now 71 , he can never exit Portugal , butas he toldGQ , he ’s fine with that .
aid with the capture of John Emil List in 1989 was maybe the most lustrous moment for long - running TV showAmerica ’s Most Wanted . List had been enjoying his freedom for over 17 eld … until a neighbour happen to be among the zillion that viewed an episode air his macabre law-breaking : in 1971 he fritter away his mother , his wife , and his three teenaged child , deliberately , carefully , one by one .
He left their bodies arranged in dance palace of their New Jersey mansion house , with spiritual euphony blasting , and move to Denver before go down in Richmond , Virginia . He changed his name , tie a woman who had no clue about his past , and — age later — was ultimately apprehended , having lived a unruffled life since his slaying spree .
After his capture , the former bank managing director and onetime rigorous Lutheran explained his motive matter - of - factly toABC News :
… His life sentence began to crumble . He suffer the bank job , and a succession of subsequent jobs . By 1971 , he was still allow for work every break of the day , but — unnamed to his mob — he was unemployed and unable to give the bills . He spent his day at the power train station recitation , napping , and wondering how to get his house out of their fiscal plenty .
He says today he experience he was letting the family down . “ I grew up with the estimation that you should ply for your kin and to do that you had to be a success in the problem that you had — or you ’re a unsuccessful person , and that was not a good thing to be , ” he say .
Finally , with the aspect of foreclosure jeopardise to expose his financial failure , List made his unspeakable decision to toss off his kinsfolk — but not himself .
“ It was my belief that if you kill yourself , you wo n’t go to heaven , ” he said . “ So eventually I got to the peak where I felt that I could vote down them . Hopefully they would go to heaven , and then maybe I would have a chance to later fink my hell to God and get forgiveness . ”
A key factor in his stoppage was a outstandingly accurate rendering of List ’s age - progressed appearance , craft for America ’s Most treasured byFrank Bender , a forensic statue maker , and Richard Walter , a criminal psychologist . List died in prison house in 2008 while serving the five execution sentences he ’d been hand in 1990 .
double collage viaLe Point .
America ’s Most Wanted is no longer on the air , but program host John Walsh recently dedicated an installment of his unexampled show , The Hunt , to another family - murder case : that of Bradford Bishop , who is believed to have shoot down his mother , married woman , and three baby . This was in 1976 , in Bethesda , Maryland ; all died from blunt - musical instrument trauma ( Bishop had purchased a ball - peen hammer the night of the killings ) . The bodies were driven some six hour away to a secret region and burned … and then Bishop , it seems , take the infernal region out of dodge .
However , all may not be what it seems here . Unlike the unremarkable John List , Bishop was a multi - lingual , extremely civilise State Department employee . According to aBethesda Magazinearticle profile the kip down law officer who ’ve been ghost by the case for decennary now :
At the State Department , Bishop had mailing in Italy , Ethiopia and Botswana , where his title was deputy chief of deputation . Before insert the Foreign Service , he spend four years in U.S. military intelligence in the former Yugoslavia . He was fluent in French , Serbo - Croatian , Spanish and Italian . [ professional dancer and syndicate friend Jacques ] d’Amboise would notice in his memoir that Bishop ’s female parent was always vague about her Word ’s jobs , and when he first find out of the slaying , d’Amboise ’s former thought was that someone was claim retaliation for Bishop ’s work as “ a spy . ”
Whatever his true work , Bishop ’s calling was a source of tension in the matrimony , according to atomic number 27 - actor and Annette ’s locality friends … The kinsfolk was having fiscal troubles , too ; the IRS was auditing its taxes .
The article touches on some of the more creative theories as to what may have hap to the Bishops , if the family patriarch did n’t do it it ; it also looks into the many sightings that’ve been reported of him over the days . As recently as last yr , an unidentified bodywas exhumed to see if DNA would prove it was Bishop ( it was n’t ) .
In April 2014,Bishop was officially lend to the FBI ’s listing of 10 Most precious Fugitives ; he ’s believed to be in Europe . To aid in the search , the FBI , which is pop the question a $ 100,000 payoff for his capture , has raise a John List - style bust ( pictured above ) of what he might appear like today .
Daily Newsletter
Get the best tech , science , and culture news in your inbox daily .
News from the future , pitch to your present .
