New York prison worker Joyce Mitchell told her husband she was in over her head as part of a plot to free two killers who remain on the run, he told NBC News in an exclusive interview.
Speaking to TODAY’s Matt Lauer, Lyle Mitchell revealed the moment he said his wife admitted she gave fugitives Richard Matt and David Sweat tools to saw through their cells.
He said Matt gave her pills that would knock him out so that she could flee with the pair. Authorities allege she later backed out of the plot when she had a change of heart.
He added: “When it came down to her hurtin’ me, that’s when she said something was wrong. She said she was in too deep, she didn’t know how to get out of it.”
Joyce Mitchell has been charged with bringing the tools into Clinton Correctional Facility, where she worked alongside Sweat and Matt in the tailor shop.
An intense manhunt was launched after the pair managed to escape through a tunnel on June 6.
Lyle Mitchell said he knew nothing about the alleged plot. He recalled how his wife of 14 years was repeatedly interviewed by police — raising his suspicions — until she finally told him of her initial alleged role.
At the police station, “an investigator comes out and says, ‘Mr Mitchell, your wife is more involved than what she’s lettin’ on’,” Lyle Mitchell said. “I asked her what was going on. She said, ‘I just — I did some things … and I got over my head.’ I didn’t know what to say. I was just … disbelief, shock.”
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How did a tailor have so much power?