Police searching for escaped Wash. murderer

Police searching for escaped Wash. murderer

Orange ladders used by Kollin Folsom and Roy Townsend to scale the prison fence are seen in this image taken from a helicopter.

By KOMO Staff

FLORENCE, Ariz. -- Authorities here are looking for one of two convicted murderers from Washington state who escaped from prison early Monday morning.

Florence Correctional Center spokesman Charles Goldsmith said Kollin Folsom and Roy Townsend escaped from the prison at about 1 a.m.

Detective Walt Hunter said Fulsom was later found in a two-story building about a mile south of Florence.


Kollin Folsom, left, and Roy Townsend are seen in booking photos provided by the Florence Correctional Center.

Townsend remains at large and officials said a "full-scale" search for Townsend is under way.

Both inmates were assigned to an evening cleaning crew and attacked and tied down a guard, Goldsmith said.

The two men then used ladders from a maintenance room to get onto the jail roof and jump the set of barbed-wire fencing.

Folsom, 24, was convicted of first-degree murder for the November 1999 stabbing death of Clinton Williams, his girlfriend's father, in Washougal, Wash.

Townsend, 37, was convicted in 1996 of arson and murder in the shooting death of 18-year-old Gerald Harkins.

Detectives found the Shelton High School student's body dumped in the woods in Mason County two weeks after the murder.

Police in Arizona on Monday found prison clothing on the ground right outside the fence, and hope tracking dogs will lead them to Townsend.

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