Troopers capture escaped Mat-Su convict

By CASEY GROVE
casey.grove@adn.com

(01/05/11 15:04:49)

PALMER -- A prisoner who escaped this morning from a Palmer jail was caught this afternoon by Alaska State Troopers in Wasilla, according to a Palmer police commander.

Kent Charles Matte, 44, broke out of Mat-Su Pretrial facility by unweaving a chain-link fence and tossing his coat over razor wire on another exterior fence before climbing over, according to Alaska State Troopers and a Department of Corrections official.

Details of Matte's capture were not immediately available from troopers.

Various law enforcement agencies in the Valley scoured the area looking for Matte, who had been on the lam since about 8:05 a.m.

Area residents were told Matte was to be considered dangerous and that he is a convicted felon, trooper spokeswoman Megan Peters said.

Schools in the Matanuska-Susitna Borough were on "stay-put" mode for much of the day as the inmate remained at large. By afternoon, students at area high schools and middle schools had been dismissed, and elementary students were set to leave at 3:30, according to school district spokeswoman Catherine Esary.

Sam Edwards, state deputy commissioner of corrections, said Matte made a hole in the side of a cage over the recreation yard and slipped through. He then placed his coat over razor wire on a 12-foot-high exterior fence and scampered over, cutting himself in the process.

Three other prisoners were in the yard at the time but no guards because none of the prisoners, including Matte, were maximum-security prisoners, Edwards said. One of the other prisoners notified the guards of the escape, he said.

Edwards said Matte had been in the jail for three months.

Children and staff in all of the Mat-Su School District's 44 schools stayed indoors, school district spokeswoman Esary said.

"That means then schools continue to operate as normal, but the outside, exterior doors are locked," Esary said.

Some schools are as far as two hours' drive from the jail, she said.

"It's just a precaution," Esary said hours before Matte's capture. "We want to make sure all our students and staff are safe."

The school district sent out recorded messages by phone to parents and news media, Esary said.

Troopers ran the investigation outside the jail, and Department of Corrections staff helped from within, said corrections spokesman Richard Schmitz.

The Mat-Su jail has a capacity of 105 prisoners, and it had 104 before this morning's escape, Edwards said. Six guards also were on duty.

Barb Smith, a customer at an industrial business near the jail, said she'd heard a lot of people talking about the escape. While Matte was still on the loose, Smith didn't seem concerned.

"I've seen about 10 cop cars this morning, so I'm not too worried," Smith said.

Kim Bergey, a Palmer mother of three getting her hair cut at Country Cutts hair salon, within sight of the jail, said she was nervous.

"I'm looking all around, looking both ways when I get out of the car," she said a few hours before troopers caught the prisoner.

Bergey's 13-year-old son Chris and her younger, elementary-school-aged daughter were with her because they had woken up late and the kids' school, Academy Charter, was locked up.

Bergey's husband Ron, a teacher at the school, called her and said, "Don't bother bringing the kids in," she said.

"This morning my husband called and said, 'Lock everything. Lock the house, lock the shed, lock your car, bring your gun,' which I did," she said.

Bergey said she doesn't usually take her .44-caliber pistol with her places, but she said she felt safer with it.

"I don't remember anything like this ever happening here before," said Bergey, who'd lived in Palmer most of her life.

Hair stylist Erin Fleming, who's lived in Palmer her whole life, said this was scarier than the schools going into stay-put mode for bomb threats.

Teenager Chris Bergey said he was glad he wasn't able to get into school today.

"Because, they're probably going to be doing a bunch of school stuff, and I don't really like school stuff."

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