Escaped Con's Memory Faulty

A convict in Oklahoma who escaped prison and took a warden's wife with him told investigators he can't remember if he kidnapped the woman or if she went willingly. They were on the lam for 10 years.

This came out at his sentencing on the escape charge.

The New York Times reports:

MANGUM, Okla., Feb. 1 — A confessed murderer who slipped out of prison with the deputy warden’s wife and hid for more than 10 years before being recaptured was sentenced Thursday to the maximum seven years for escaping.

Questioned by prosecutors about details of the relationship, the escapee, Randolph F. Dial, said he could not remember.

The warden’s wife, Bobbi Parker, 44, disappeared from the Oklahoma State Reformatory in Granite with Mr. Dial in August 1994. They were discovered living together in a trailer on a chicken farm in East Texas in April 2005.

“I took her with me,” Mr. Dial testified under cross-examination after offering a rambling account from the witness stand of what he portrayed as plots by prison authorities to kill him.

“Did she help you or assist you?” asked an assistant district attorney, Eric Yarborough.

“I don’t know,” Mr. Dial responded, after acknowledging that the couple had driven off together in Ms. Parker’s van. To follow-up questions, he also replied, “I don’t remember.”