An Oregon state prison escapee who had been on the run for nearly three decades was apprehended in Georgia on Tuesday. Steven Craig Johnson, 70, had escaped from the Mill Creek Correctional Facility in Salem, Oregon, in 1994 where he was serving time for sexual abuse charges. Johnson had been in custody since 1989.
Authorities arrested Johnson at an apartment complex in Macon, Georgia, where he had been living under the stolen identity of a deceased child since 2011. He had obtained the child's birth certificate and Social Security number, as well as a Georgia driver's license using this false identity.
The US Marshals Service, in collaboration with a fugitive task force, captured Johnson following an investigation that was initiated in 2015 at the request of the Oregon Department of Corrections. The case saw new developments this year with the help of advanced investigative technology employed by the US State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service.
Johnson is currently being held at Bibb County jail in Georgia awaiting extradition back to Oregon. It is unclear if he has legal representation at this time.
Described as a pedophile with a high risk of victimizing pre-teen boys, Johnson was listed as one of Oregon’s most wanted fugitives. The closure of Mill Creek Correctional Facility in 2021, as part of sentencing reform efforts by then-Governor Kate Brown, marked the end of an era for the facility that had been operational since 1929.
The decision to shut down three Oregon prisons, including Mill Creek, was aimed at saving the state over $44 million and shifting focus towards reducing incarceration rates and investing in crime prevention initiatives.
