'Devil in the Ozarks' Learns Fate for His Escape

The convicted killer and rapist nicknamed the "Devil in the Ozarks" just had more than a decade added to his existing sentence following his prison escape last year. Grant Hardin, 57, was given an additional 13-year term Tuesday after pleading guilty to second-degree escape, to be served on top of the 80 years he's currently serving, Izard County Sheriff Charley Melton told KAIT8. The earlier sentence is for the 2017 shooting death of a Gateway city employee and the 1997 rape of an elementary school teacher during a Sunday church service in the school cafeteria, per KHBS.

Hardin broke out of the North Central Unit, a medium-security prison in Calico Rock, Arkansas, on May 25, 2024, slipping through a sally port in what officials say was a fake prison uniform he'd created. The escape triggered a multi-agency manhunt that lasted nearly two weeks, until tracking dogs picked up his scent. Officers caught him about 1.5 miles from the prison on June 6. Fox News reports that he's now housed at the Varner Supermax facility in Gould, according to state corrections records.