Captured fugitive behind bars again after treatment

Captured prison escapee David Sweat was released last night from a New York hospital where he had been treated for gunshot wounds and moved to a prison over 400km away from the one he fled, authorities said.

Sweat, who was captured last Sunday following a three-week manhunt, will be locked up alone in a cell for 23 hours a day and placed on suicide watch at Five Points Correctional Facility in Romulus, in the state’s Finger Lakes region, the department of corrections and community supervision said.

Sweat, 35, and accomplice Richard Matt escaped from maximum security Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, New York, on June 6. Matt, 49, was shot and killed by a federal agent on June 26 about 43km away from the prison.

The pair, both convicted murderers, had lived in prison in so-called honour housing which offered limited privileges to prisoners considered to be well-behaved.

In their brazen break-out, Matt and Sweat cut holes in their cell walls, climbed down a catwalk, slipped through a steam pipe, and emerged from a manhole outside prison walls, said officials.

Sweat, who was shot twice in the torso by a state police trooper during his capture near the Canadian border, was released from Albany Medical Centre, the department of corrections and community supervision said. After a medical evaluation, Sweat will be held in special housing in a cell equipped with a bed, writing platform, toilet, sink, and shower, prison authorities said.

Two Clinton prison workers are charged with helping in the escape.