After 11 days on the run, convicted murderer Bradley "Hurtie" Maxwell was back behind bars Wednesday on St. Croix.
At 4 a.m. Wednesday, law enforcement officers involved in "Operation Sniff" received a telephone call saying Maxwell, 22, was at his mother’s home in the Paradise housing community, St. Croix Deputy Police Chief Novelle Francis said.
Officers obtained a search warrant and searched the apartment but Maxwell wasn’t there. At about 10 a.m., the Department of Justice received a call from a "concerned citizen" saying that Maxwell wanted to turn himself in because "he feared for his life," Francis said.
About two hours later, Maxwell surrendered to law enforcement officers without incident and was taken to Patrick Sweeney Headquarters, where he was charged with escape from custody, Francis said.
Francis said the word out in the community was that the Operation Sniff task force, made up of police, Bureau of Corrections officers and Department of Justice officials, was intent on getting the two-time escapee off the streets by any means necessary.
"He feared for his life, and I think the task force manhunt played a key role" in his surrender, Francis said.
During Maxwell's 11 days on the lam, law enforcement authorities stressed that he was believed to be armed and was considered dangerous. He was serving 30 years for murdering a St. Thomas bar owner in 1997 and an additional five years for escaping from the Sub Base Jail Annex on St. Thomas in 1998. He is under investigation in another murder case and is a suspect in a third.
After he escaped July 30, "based on information, he was armed," Francis said. "But when he was apprehended, he was not."
Francis said investigators meanwhile are looking into the likelihood that Maxwell was aided by friends in recent days. "There is some intelligence that has been gathered," he said, "and that is a matter of investigation."
