Killers on the run: Capture of Danelo Cavalcante rekindles memories of 1999 Norman Johnston escape
BALTIMORE -- The escape and capture of Danelo Cavalcante bears striking similarities to the apprehension of Norman Johnston, a member of a notorious criminal family who broke out of his cell in August of 1999.
Johnston was on the run for 18 days, creating fear in Cecil County where he had family and criminal ties.
"Both of these guys were convicted murderers, and Cavalcante is like a modern-day [Johnston] in the sense of the violence of his crime and what he's capable of," said Lieutenant Shawn Mahan of the Cecil County Sheriff's Office, who was a recruit in the academy when Johnston escaped. "I found myself walking in the Black Snake creek where there was a sighting of him that occurred on Blue Ball road in Elkton. It was pretty tense. Here I am brand new, not even finished the academy yet, and we're walking down a creek in the middle of nowhere."
Both Cavalcante and Johnston escaped in novel ways: Cavalcante crab walked up the prison walls and onto the roof. Johnston cut his cell bars and tunneled out, leaving a dummy replete with real human hair in his bed.
It got him a 10-hour head start before any of the guards noticed.
WJZ spoke to several members of law enforcement in Cecil County for this story.
They will never forget the intense search in 1999.
"Especially with a dangerous person like that, you don't know if they're going to come in in front of you or behind you," said Corporal William Sewell, who was in the police academy at the time. "Pretty much your head is on a swivel."
"It was huge. For those 18 days he was out, that was everything that was going on," retired Sergeant Don Kellum told WJZ. "That's pretty much everything everyone was talking about was to capture him."
Tips were pouring in across Cecil County, including in Elk Mills where Johnston was seen along the railroad tracks and in Leeds where authorities spotted him at the home of a relative. A concert had to be called off in Fair Hill.
"Now, we've got drones. We've got Ring cameras. We've got cell phones. Why escape today because you're going to get caught," said senior deputy first class Greg Passwaters.
Back in 1999, Johnston always seemed a step ahead.
"As soon as he was spotted, they tried to get people there, but you're always behind," said Major George Stanko.
Back then, Stanko was with Newark, Delaware police and assigned to the special task force created to capture Johnston.
He remembers how the fugitive narrowly escaped a police officer at the University of Delaware.
"He was confronted in the middle of the night by a University of Delaware officer who happened to find him near the railroad tracks, and they got in a scuffle. Back then, the University of Delaware police didn't carry firearms, so he basically had a nightstick for his protection," Major Stanko recalled. "Norman was able to get away from him, but he threw his night stick and hit him in the back and got away. There just wasn't enough police to chase him down."
Stanko did recover Norman Johnston's backpack "which was the last of the property he had in this world, so he had absolutely nothing on him at the time he was captured by Pennsylvania State Police. All his possessions were in that knapsack."
"He had to either steal to get something more or he was going to get caught. You kind of run out of options after a while," Major Stanko told WJZ Investigator Mike
Hellgren.
Like Cavalcante, Johnston stole food from gardens and broke into homes, which ratcheted up the fear with many older residents knowing his past.
"He was a convicted killer. He killed two police officers in Pennsylvania with a rifle outside their station—totally defenseless when he shot them—and he was proud of that," Stanko said.
The 1986 movie 'At Close Range' with Christopher Walken and Sean Penn was based on the Johnston family gang.
"You had video stores back then. It was sold out. You couldn't buy it, so that was the big talk of the town," Kellum said.
When he escaped, Johnston had already been in prison for almost 20 years, and he was no match for the modern world.
"He had stolen a car, which he was an expert at, but he didn't know how to pump gas so time got him," said Mahan.
That car, a green Oldsmobile Cutlass, was part of his final getaway.
He lead authorities on a ten-mile chase before crashing. He was soon found coming out of the woods exhausted.
"He pretty much said something to the effect of, 'You guys don't quit, and you guys don't let up,'" said Captain Michael Holmes. "Both Johnson and Cavalcante were convicted murderers, and we've had other escapees in this area from time to time but not convicted murderers. And that is priority number one. You have people who are desperate. They don't want to go back to jail."
The two killers—Johnston and Cavalcante— tried to outrun the law for one last taste of freedom. Holmes said it was inevitable they would get caught.
"There's really nothing to lose, so you do worry about a violent ending. Thank God for both of these that they were captured without any more violence," Holmes said.
Johnston is still alive today. He is in his 70s in a prison in northern Pennsylvania about 300 miles away from Cecil County.
Cavalcante is currently serving his life sentence at the maximum-security prison in Collegeville, Pennsylvania.
