MISSION, Kan. — An inmate whose escape from a Kansas prison hidden in a dog crate became the subject of a book and a TV movie has died behind bars.
John Manard, who was 45, died Sunday at La Palma Correctional Facility, a private prison in Eloy, Arizona, according to the Kansas Department of Corrections. His cause of death is pending the results of an autopsy, said department spokeswoman Jennifer King.
Manard was serving a life sentence for a suburban Kansas City murder in a prison in Lansing, Kansas, when he met Toby Young, a married mother of two who worked helping inmates train animals for adoption. They began a romantic relationship.
On February 12, 2006, Young, then 47, hid Manard, then 27, in a box and helped him escape.
Prison officials said she used the trust she gained while running the program to force Manard out of prison. A guard who recognized Young did not search the van thoroughly.
Young and Manard were captured 12 days after the escape in eastern Tennessee on Interstate 75 between Knoxville and Chattanooga, about 90 miles (145 kilometers) south of a remote cabin they had shared.
Young, whose husband filed for divorce after her arrest, was convicted in state court for her role in breaking out Manard. She also pleaded guilty in federal court to giving him a gun. She was released in 2008 and wrote about what happened in the book “Living With Conviction”.
“John is finally free. But I’m devastated,” Young, who has since remarried and goes by Toby Dorr, said on a Facebook page post Wednesday. “I pray you have finally found the peace you were looking for, John.”
The escape story was also featured on “Dateline” and is the inspiration behind the Lifetime movie, “Jailbreak Lovers.”
In a March 2006 letter to a Kansas City television station, Manard said that he and Young “have a fairytale love as big as infinity.”