PICKENS COUNTY — After nearly five full days, a manhunt conducted by the Pickens County Sheriff’s office has come to an end.
Escapees Jonathan Dean Moody and Rickylee Charles Eugene Smith have been returned to custody.
Rickylee Smith was apprehended on Sunday afternoon following a telephone call to the Sheriff’s Office.
According to the Pickens County Sheriff’s Office, Rickylee Smith, called a deputy on Sunday afternoon around 12:30 p.m. to turn himself in.
“We stayed right behind him the whole time and one of the deputies received a cell phone call from him and he told the deputy that he was hungry and cold and was tired of running. We sent that deputy out there to pick him up,” Captain Keith Galloway said.
Galloway said that Smith was captured near the Oconee County line and that he had been in the woods since Tuesday.
Both men will face additional charges.
“We served both individuals with warrants for escape, and we are probably going to charge at least two in the jail for aiding and abetting,” Galloway said.
Galloway declined to name any prisoner suspected of aiding and abetting the escapees.
Jonathan Dean Moody had been charged with armed robbery, grand larceny, manufacturing and distribution of methamphetamine, malicious injury to personal property and receiving stolen goods.
Rickylee Charles Eugene Smith had been charged with first and second degree burglary, grand larceny, petit larceny, simple larceny and simple possession of marijuana.
According to the Sheriff’s Office, Smith did not receive any help from friends or family while on the run.
“The family had been quite helpful and tried to do the right thing and encouraging Rickylee to turn himself in,” Galloway said.
According to the Pickens County Sheriff’s Office, the men escaped together.
“About 8:30 p.m. Tuesday night, they were able to compromise a locked door that went out onto the rec yard,” Galloway said. “Both of them are pretty small guys, 5’6, 5’7, 135 and 140 pounds, and they were able to help each other get up the side of the rec yard where there was a small area of fence that had about a foot or so section that had been compromised. I don’t know whether they had been working on that or not, but they were able to squeeze through that little area.”
Jonathan Dean Moody was found less than a mile from the Pickens County Detention Center during a search conducted on Wednesday Nov. 21.
“At about 12 p.m. we left the perimeter with the dogs that we kept through the wee-hours of the morning, but we had deputies keeping the perimeter loose,” Galloway said. “(Right about that time) Jonathan Moody walked out of a small wooded area that was inside the perimeter. One of our guys spotted him and took him into custody.”
Galloway expressed his appreciation for everyone involved in the manhunt.
“We have had teams on the ground since Tuesday. The people have done an exemplary job and I would really like to show my praise for them, the Pickens County Sheriff’s Office, the Pickens City Police Department, the Liberty City Police Department, the South Carolina Highway Patrol, and the U.S. Marshall’s Office,” Galloway said. I would really like to praise those individuals, those agencies, and especially the guys on the teams, they have been non-stop since Tuesday and kept the pressure on him and its ended in a successful arrest,”
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