The search for an escapee from the county jail ended Saturday when the prisoner turned himself in.
Jonathan M. Owens, 25, had been serving a one-year sentence for cold checks, jailer Jon Sallee said, and was a work-release inmate staying in the restricted-custody center of the Jessamine County Detention Center last week. With more cold-check charges pending, jail officials were moving him to the main facility around 12:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 16, when he ran out of the building and fled on foot.
Owens turned himself in Saturday, Sallee said.
“Around 1 p.m. Saturday, I negotiated a return with his mother,” he said. “I’d been working with her since the escape, because he’d probably go back to her.”
Owens was charged with first-degree escape and a warrant was served for identity theft, Sallee said. He is scheduled to appear in Jessamine District Court on Monday, Feb. 27, at 2 p.m.
