An Oregon man who escaped from prison in 1994 was arrested in Georgia on Tuesday.
In November 1994, Steven Craig Johnson was serving time for sexual abuse and attempted sodomy at Mill Creek Correctional Facility when he allegedly fled from a work crew. The U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) said Johnson, 70, who was living at an apartment complex in Macon, Georgia, stole the identity of William Cox — a child who died in Texas in 1962, according to Central Oregon Daily News.
Johnson allegedly got the child’s birth certificate and acquired a Social Security number in Texas in 1995. He obtained a driver’s license three years later, U.S. Marshals said.
According to NPR, the Mill Creek Correctional Facility is a minimum-security prison in Salem that closed in 2021. He had served five years of a 15-year sentence when he escaped.
In 2019, the Oregon Department of Corrections issued an alert for Johnson which described him as a “pedophile” who had a high likelihood of “victimizing pre-teen boys,” according to the Salem Statesman Journal.
U.S. Marshals got involved in the case in 2014. Emerging technology sparked a break in the case earlier this year.
Residents told WGXA that they frequently saw Johnson, who lived on the fifth floor.
“I’ve known him, I mean, about the first week I moved here I met him. They call him Bud here. I mean I didn’t even really know his whole name,” one neighbor said.
Johnson is being held at Bibb County jail in Georgia as he awaits extradition to Oregon.
