Prison escapee had help, may have fled state

BANGOR — A state prison inmate who escaped from a work release job site this week had help from at least one co-worker and investigators suspect he has fled the state.

Lance Morgan Palmer, 31, was last seen late Wednesday night getting a ride outside a residence in Dayton, a small town in York County, according to Jim Cole, director of the Bangor Pre-Release Center. Convicted for criminal threatening with a dangerous weapon, Palmer was an inmate at the center, where he had four months remaining on his sentence.

Palmer on Wednesday was participating in a work release program at a construction site in Norridgewock. He was employed by the Bangor firm N.S. Giles Foundations when he failed to return to the Bangor center.

Cole said authorities now know that one of the men Palmer worked with on the site is a convicted felon and a former fellow inmate with Palmer. The man admitted to investigators that he and a second worker didn’t drive back to Bangor to return Palmer, but had gone to Dayton instead.

The man said they had been drinking throughout the evening and that he gave Palmer $250 to $300. Authorities also learned that Palmer had made phone calls from the residence and in the middle of the night was picked up by someone.

Cole said Palmer likely headed out of state, although investigators continue to look for him in Maine. Authorities are also reviewing what role the two construction workers and others played in the escape. Also being questioned is how Palmer was allowed to work with a convicted felon, which is prohibited under work release rules.

Cole said he didn’t know who lived at the Dayton residence or who picked him up, but noted that Palmer has ties to the area. Palmer’s brother lives in the Berwick area and Palmer previously lived in Hollis Center in York County, according to a Maine Department of Corrections document.

Bangor police were alerted about 9:15 p.m. Wednesday that the three men in the company’s pickup truck hadn’t returned. The two employees showed up at the work site Thursday morning, initially claiming they had dropped Palmer off in Bangor Wednesday night, according to Cole and police.

Palmer is the second Pre-Release Center inmate in a month to flee a work site, an “unfortunate wrinkle in the program” which at any given time can have as many as 40 inmates working in communities, Cole said. Sixteen inmates during the past 25 years have escaped from the center, with everyone but Palmer having been recaptured. Palmer’s being returned to custody is only a matter of time, Cole said.

The price of freedom likely will prove expensive for Palmer, who faces completion of his four months as well as the four years of his original sentence that had been suspended. He likely will face an escape charge, which can carry with it a five-year sentence.

“All that is going to come back and haunt him, in addition to the new charges,” Cole said.

Late last month, Stephen Gross took a company pickup truck from a Veazie construction site and was arrested two days later in Machias.

Some escapees manage to elude authorities for longer periods of time, Cole acknowledged. Scott Hart, then 26, was on the lam for about a month in 1997 before he was arrested in Florida on an armed robbery charge. Cole said Hart had 10 months to serve in Maine before his escape, but is now serving up to 25 years in Florida.

Palmer is described as being 5 feet 11 inches tall and weighing 195 pounds with blond hair and blue eyes. He has several tattoos on various parts of his body, including several skulls and two Grim Reapers.