Richard Lee McNair’s Prison Escape By Mail

U.S. Marshals ServiceRichard Lee McNair mailed himself out of prison in 2006.

Richard Lee McNair wasn’t your traditional prison escapist. On the contrary, he used a brilliantly unorthodox method to regain his freedom and managed to mail himself out of jail. While the convicted murderer would ultimately be recaptured and secured in a maximum-security facility, his ingenuity is one for the books.

McNair was raised by a police officer and displayed a strong intellect as a child. However, he would use that savvy to rob a grain storage facility in Minot, North Dakota, on Nov. 17, 1987. He shot two men who startled him in the process, one of whom died of their wounds. McNair was convicted of first-degree murder and attempted murder.

The shootings earned McNair two life sentences, while a burglary charge added another 30 years to his sentence. McNair was desperate to escape his new concrete confines. Languishing in North Dakota State Penitentiary, he managed to escape through a ventilation pipe in 1992, but would be recaptured in 1993.

YouTubeA still from the police video of Richard Lee McNair speaking with a police officer shortly after his escape.

However, his prison escape attempt on April 5, 2006, at a federal prison in Pollock, Louisiana, would cement McNair as a truly notable prison escapist. After building a makeshift compartment complete with a breathing tube and fitting himself inside it, he placed himself beside a mailbag pile that was taken to a nearby warehouse with a forklift — outside the prison.

“The heat was unbelievable,” he said. “The inside of the pod felt like a furnace. Sweat rolled off me; my head was swimming in the fog. I was afraid I would pass out. It was a tight fit. I couldn’t wipe the sweat from my brow; it was running into my eyes, down my neck, dripping from the tip of my nose and everywhere else.”

Once the warehouse staff left for lunch, McNair bolted. Even when he was caught running down nearby railroad tracks by a police officer, he convinced the cop he wasn’t the prison escapee authorities had been notified about. He remained at large until late 2007 when he was arrested for driving a stolen vehicle.

Promptly re-incarcerated, McNair languishes in a Colorado supermax prison today. With high-profile inmates like Boston bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev as his peers, it’s unlikely McNair will be able to fool his captors again.

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