A frantic search is currently in progress in Arkansas following the escape of a disgraced former police chief, convicted of murder and sexual assault, from prison.

A frantic search is currently in progress in Arkansas following the escape of a disgraced former police chief, convicted of murder and sexual assault, from prison. The Arkansas Department of Corrections reported that Grant Hardin, 56, broke free from the North Central Unit on Sunday afternoon in Calico Rock, AR.

“Anyone with knowledge of inmate Hardin’s location should reach out to local law enforcement right away,” officials stated in a post on X. Authorities disclosed that Hardin had been incarcerated at the North Central Unit since 2017, serving a 30-year sentence for first-degree murder, along with another sentence for sexual assault. The facility noted that Hardin previously held the position of police chief in Gateway.

Hardin admitted to the 2017 murder of James Appleton, 59, a city water employee found shot in the face inside his work vehicle, according to KNWA. While Hardin was being processed into the state prison, officials entered his DNA sample into a database, which led to a match with a 1997 cold case involving the sexual assault of a teacher. The victim, Amy Harrison, a teacher at Frank Tillery Elementary in Rogers, described how she was assaulted by a man armed with a gun at the school.

“It was definitively proven that Mr. Hardin was the perpetrator beyond all scientific doubt,” Nathan Smith, the Benton County prosecuting attorney at the time, remarked. Authorities affirmed that Hardin’s DNA matched that of the rape suspect. Harrison was attacked while preparing a lesson plan for the week, and the case had remained unsolved for almost two decades. Hardin ultimately pleaded guilty to the sexual assault in 2019.

“In my opinion, Grant Hardin is one of the most perilous individuals I have encountered, as he does not initially come off that way,” Smith previously stated. “He is capable of committing a seemingly random, abominable murder as well as a random, ghastly sexual assault.”

Hanslem MacDonald