NC man caught in Ga. 16 years after prison escape

SAVANNAH, Ga. (AP) A convicted killer who escaped from the North Carolina prison sixteen years ago was captured Thursday in the rural Georgia town where authorities say he'd settled down with the family, bought the mobile home and started his own business selling pine straw.Manuel Hrneith, 49, is awaiting extradition from Tattnall County in southeast Georgia back to North Carolina, where he was serving an 18-year sentence for second-degree murder and other crimes until he escaped from the minimum-security prison in Wilmington in May 1995.North Carolina authorities found no trace of the fugitive until last week, when the tip pointed them to tiny Cobbtown, Ga., about 60 miles west of Savannah."Apparently he must've been the model citizen," pronounced Tommy Long, supervisory deputy for the U.S. Marshals Service in Savannah. "The guy's left sixteen years and didn't get in trouble, not even the traffic stop."The escapee had been living in Tattnall County under the alias Alfredo Arrieta Urieta since at least 2004, when property records uncover he bought the mobile home. He lived with the woman who told sheriff's deputies she was his wife, as well as three children she identified as theirs.Hrneith made his living raking, bundling and selling pine straw, and told authorities which he often traveled out of Georgia to broach to buyers, pronounced Capt. Kevin Keyfauver of the Tattnall County Sheriff's Office.Keyfauver pronounced the fugitive had about four rifles and handguns in his home, but he surrendered peacefully when authorities showed up at 1 a.m. Thursday."We went out and asked him what his real name was and he told us, and we asked him if he had problems in NC and he said, 'Yeah,'" Keyfauver said.Hrneith was convicted of second-degree murder in 1991 in Pitt County, N.C., though District Attorney Clark Everett pronounced Thursday he did not remember the box and could not immediately find who the victim was or any other details.Hrneith faces charges in Tattnall County for being the convicted felon in posses! sion of guns.Keyfauver pronounced the escapee waived extradition back to North Carolina, where prison officials are ready to lapse him to the cell after sixteen years."We hope to have him back in custody soon," pronounced Pamela Walker, the spokeswoman for the North Carolina Department of Corrections.