Man serving mail fraud sentence walks away from Leavenworth penitentiary’s satellite camp

A 50-year-old Texas man who was serving a sentence for mail fraud is missing and believed to have escaped from a prison camp at the U.S. Penitentiary in Leavenworth, prison officials said in a news release.

James Thompson of Maud, Texas, was discovered missing from the satellite camp, a minimum security facility adjacent to the prison, about 4 p.m. Thursday, said Edna Main, public information officer for the prison.

Thompson was described as a white male, about 6-feet-2-inches tall, weighing about 202 pounds. He has brown hair and brown eyes.

The prison notified the U.S. Marshals Service, the Federal Bureau of Investigations and other law enforcement agencies. The prison has started an internal investigation into the escape.

Anyone with information about the whereabouts of Thompson is asked to contact the U.S. Marshals Service at 913-551-6727.

In April 2022, a federal judge sentenced both Thompson and his wife, April Thompson, to six years and eight months in prison. They were convicted of mail fraud in the theft of more than $4 million from an Atlanta-based company that provides timberland investment advisory and management services for institutional timberland investors, according to a news release from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia.