Prison break Paedophile on run for 30 years used dead child’s ID to live in plain sight

Johnson now (left) and around the time of his prison break (Image: Oregon Department of Corrections)

A wanted paedophile evaded capture for 30 years by living under the assumed identity of a dead child.

Steven Craig Johnson, now 70, escaped from prison on November 29, 1994 after he had been arrested for three counts of first-degree sex abuse and one count of first-degree attempted sodomy.

He was finally arrested on Tuesday at around 2pm at an apartment complex in Macon, Georgia.

It was more than 2,700 miles away from the former Mill Creek Correctional Facility in Salem, Oregon, he escaped from.

Johnson was described as a paedophile that presents a high probability of victimising pre-teen boys,’ according to the Oregon Department of Corrections.

Police discovered that Johnson lived at the complex since 2011 under the name of William Cox, who was a child who died in Texas in January 1962.

It is believed that Johnson obtained a copy of the dead child’s birth certificate soon after his escape and in 1995 obtained social Security in Texas with the identity.

In 1998 he was able to get a driving licence in Georgia, using the identity, police said.

In 2015 the US Marshals Service took over the hunt for Johnson, with multiple leads to pursue.

Four years later the Oregon Department of Correction distributed a wanted poster, describing Johnson as someone who “should not be allowed contact with children,” describing him as one of its most wanted fugitives.

After his capture, he is now being held Georgia’s Bibb County Jail ahead of extradition back to Oregon.

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