OPINION: Will a Sarasota killer ever be caught? It's been 33 years
Escaped murderer Danelo Cavalcante was captured in Pennsylvania Wednesday morning after 13 days on the run. Most people go on vacation longer than that. Just ask Glen Chambers. If you can find him, that his. Or if he's still alive.
Chambers remains a Hall-of-Fame fugitive, while Cavalcante would have had to stay underground for the next three decades just to get his name on the ballot. That's a lot of nights holed up in a Vermont log cabin, or days as a deckhand in Puerto Vallarta.
Cavalcante, who is now going back to prison for killing his girlfriend in front of her children, had been on the run for about as long as the average honeymoon lasts. Chambers, who killed his girlfriend in Sarasota, has not been seen for 33 years after escaping, or four times longer than the average marriage lasts.
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Though Chambers' prison break in and of itself is impressive in a Netflix kind of way, the act that led him there in the first place is despicable.
On Jan. 22, 1975, Chambers assaulted 21-year-old Connie Weeks in the parking lot of Sarasota Lanes, a bowling alley where she worked as a server. Chambers went to jail. Weeks bailed him out.
They went back to the Sarasota apartment they shared, where Chambers attacked her again. He carried her into Sarasota Memorial Hospital with severe brain trauma. Her blood was found in their apartment and in his car. She died five days later.
Chambers was sentenced to death (changed to life in prison) on July 11, 1975, and was being held in the Sarasota County Jail. Two days later, he escaped down a rope made of bed sheets. Three days after that, he was captured and eventually sent to Polk County Correctional Institution.
For years, he was a model inmate and earned a job making furniture. On Feb. 21, 1990, he placed himself in a wooden box that was loaded onto a truck to be delivered to Daytona Beach.
Somewhere along Interstate 4, when traffic was at a crawl, he popped out of the box, opened the back door of the truck, and walked away.
No one has seen him since.
Chambers had a few things going for him. Back then, there was no digital fingerprint. It was much easier to obtain a fake ID and start a new life. Chambers also learned to speak Spanish in prison, and his IQ was on a Mensa level.
Over the years, tips have come in from as far away as New Zealand, yet nothing concrete. Chambers would be 71 now. It is possible that he is still alive.
He has not been arrested since the escape, as his fingerprints would have turned up in an ID system.
Basically, he just vanished. Keep your eyes peeled. If he is still alive, he is living life as quietly as can be. Killers who escape prison and then go undetected for three decades generally don't kill again. Maybe he is among us.
Remember that older gentleman you saw pushing carts at Publix the other day? How about the nice old-school crossing guard you waved to? Or the guy on the beach with the metal detector? Or the guy you nearly hit with that drive on 18?
Any of them could be the person who killed Connie Weeks in Sarasota in 1975 and then jumped out of a furniture truck to become one of the most determined escapees in the history of American crime.
After all, he did have a tattoo that said "Live Free or Die."
This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: A Sarasota killer escaped prison 33 years ago. Catch him if you can
