A man who escaped from an Oregon state prison almost 30 years ago and assumed the identity of a deceased child has been apprehended in Georgia, per CNN.
Steven Craig Johnson, now 70, was convicted of sexual abuse charges and had been in Oregon Department of Corrections custody since June 1989. He escaped from prison in 1994 and has been living under a different name since 2011.
He was arrested by the US Marshals Service on Tuesday and is now awaiting extradition back to Oregon. This case was reopened in 2015 and new leads were developed using advanced investigative technology. Johnson had reportedly stolen the identity of a child who died in Texas in January 1962. He was able to obtain a copy of the child’s birth certificate and was eventually able to get a Social Security number in Texas in 1995.
Johnson was considered one of Oregon’s most wanted fugitives. He
“is a pedophile and presents a high probability of victimizing pre-teen boys,”
a 2019 wanted poster from the corrections department stated.
“Fugitive Johnson should not be allowed contact with children.”
According to Johnson’s neighbors, he was a quiet man and kept to himself.
#Clique, what are your thoughts?
