Joyce Mitchell was charmed by convicted killer Richard Matt. He "made her feel special". Photo / AP
Joyce Mitchell was charmed by convicted killer Richard Matt. He "made her feel special". Photo / AP
With handcuffs on her wrists and eyes downcast, Joyce Mitchell looks less like a plotter in one of America's most audacious jail breaks and more like a woman who has realised she has made a terrible mistake.
Prosecutors allege that the 51-year-old prison sewing instructor fell under the charms of Richard Matt, a killer serving a life sentence for dismembering his former boss with a hacksaw.
The two met in the prison tailoring shop, where Mrs Mitchell taught convicts how to use sewing machines. Here, police believe that Matt "made her feel special" and coaxed her into providing the tools that he needed to dig his way out of Clinton Correction Facility in New York state.
On the run: David Sweat, left, and Richard Matt. Photo / AP
More than a week after Matt, 48, and his accomplice David Sweat, another killer, made their escape, police appear no closer to finding the fugitives.
But investigators have gathered enough evidence to charge Mrs Mitchell with aiding the escape, telling a court that she had provided "hacksaw blades, chisels, a punch and a screwdriver bit" to the two murderers.
She pleaded not guilty to charges which could see her imprisoned for eight years.
Her second husband, Lyle Mitchell, who also works at the prison, is said to be under investigation but has not been arrested or charged.
While police tramp through forests and search house-by-house for the missing inmates, the prison authorities are left to grapple with uncomfortable questions.
How could one of their own have helped two killers break free? Who else was involved in the plot? How were the men able to escape from what was supposed to be one of New York's most secure facilities?
Richard Matt should be an easy man to dislike. In 1997, he kidnapped a 76-year-old man and beat him savagely before driving him around in the boot of his car for 27 hours.
Eventually he snapped his victim's neck with his bare hands and chopped his body into pieces before throwing it into the Niagara River, where it was discovered by fisherman. "He is the most vicious, evil person I've ever come across in 38 years as a police officer," Gabriel DiBernardo, a retired police detective who led the murder probe, told The New York Times.
Mitchell is escorted out of the Plattsburgh City Courthouse following her arraignment. Photo / AP
But despite his viciousness, Matt is said to possess a certain cunning charm. He impressed prison staff with his artistic abilities and liked to sketch pictures of Oprah Winfrey, according to the Daily Beast.
He is believed to have worked his powers of persuasion on Mrs Mitchell and befriended her.
It is not clear if Mrs Mitchell fell in love with the convicted killer, whose body is covered in tattoos, or if she was just won over by his charisma.
Either way, prosecutors say, she supplied the tools which Matt and Sweat used to cut through the steel walls of their cells and into a pipe that led to the outside world. In addition, they say that her mobile phone was used to call people related to Matt.
Mrs Mitchell may also have agreed to give the two killers a lift in her car, but she appears to have lost her nerve and backed out at the last minute. She spent part of last weekend in hospital for a panic attack.
Mrs Mitchell's son, Tobey, insisted that his mother loved her work and would never betray her colleagues by helping inmates escape.
"She is not the kind of person that's going to risk her life or other people's lives to let these guys escape from prison," he told NBC.
But her first husband, also called Tobey, has painted a less flattering portrait, accusing of her of being unfaithful during their five-year marriage.
Mrs Mitchell, who lived an hour east of Clinton Correction Facility, seems to have taken pride in her job and posted on Facebook in 2013: "It takes balls to work behind the walls. No guns ??? just pure guts." She has been cooperating with police but authorities have so far been unable to locate Matt and Sweat, who were found to be missing last Saturday after they bought time by leaving dummies made of clothes in their beds and left a mocking note featuring a crude, racial caricature.
Hundreds of heavily-armed officers continued to search the Dannemora area immediately around the prison, where bloodhounds are believed to have picked up the scent of the fugitives.
Around 800 police, backed by helicopters were combing the area yesterday, but the authorities admitted that while their focus remained near the Clinton Correctional Facility, the two men could have slipped into the neighbouring state of Vermont or even crossed the border into Canada.
