A “very dangerous” armed felon, who is accused of at least three slayings across two states, has been caught following a two-day manhunt.
Stacy Lee Drake, 50, was taken into custody around 10 a.m. Thursday by the Morrilton Police Department and Arkansas State Police, according to a statement released by the Conway County Sheriff’s Office in Arkansas. He was found in the woods near the intersection of University Boulevard and Poor Farm Road just west of a Walmart.
Drake has been linked to the killings of a man and woman in Sallisaw, Oklahoma, whose bodies were found inside a business around 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, according to the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation.
He is also accused of the May 14 killing of Russell Andrews, 62, in Alabama, Tuscaloosa County Sheriff’s deputies said.
Drake is being held at the Conway County Detention Center. No further details were immediately provided by authorities.
Drake, whose last known address was in Birmingham, Alabama, had been “in Tuscaloosa a few weeks” before the slaying and was “using a false name,” according to a statement by Sheriff’s Capt. Jack Kennedy.
The victims have not been identified by police, but one victim in the Oklahoma double homicide was named by family as Taylor Sharp. In a social media post before he was caught, Sharp’s family urged people to be cautious if they encountered Drake.
“My family needs prayers and we also want Justice for my nephew Taylor Sharp, he was one of the two murdered victims in Sequoyah County,” Linda Biggs, posted on Facebook.
The manhunt began after Morrilton Police Department received a tip Tuesday from state police about a stolen vehicle, parked at a local hotel, that had been spotted at the scene of a double murder in Oklahoma.
Arkansas State Police had issued a warning to residents in the Morrilton area, where he was last seen, to keep their eyes out for Drake who had “purchased camping gear and all indications are he is still in the Morrilton area,” which is about 50 miles northwest of Little Rock, state police had said at the time.
Drake is a convicted felon with a sprawling rap sheet that includes burglary, kidnapping, armed robbery, and aggravated assault against an officer.
He was sentenced to 22 years in 2010 after being convicted of carjacking; being a felon in possession of a firearm; and brandishing a firearm during the carjacking, according to KSCB News.
Drake was accused of threatening a man with a .45 caliber pistol as the man left a grocery store and stole his wallet, food, and red GMC truck. He was chased by police for eight miles before he crashed the truck and was captured.
At the time, he was facing prosecution for at least four other crimes in Oklahoma, Arkansas and Alabama, according to the Tuscaloosa office of the FBI.
