“He Has Nothing To Lose” Family, Friends Terrified As Escaped Convicted Murderer Remains On The Loose

00:00:02
Speaker 1: Hey there folks, it is Thursday, October 29th, and he escaped from a Tennessee prison on Sunday. He made his way to Illinois. That's where authorities are hot on his trail, but admit, they do not really know where this convicted murderer is. The family of his victim, not taking any chances. And with that, welcome to this episode of Amy and TJ... ropes?

00:00:29
Speaker 2: Uh.

00:00:31
Speaker 1: If you're the family and friends of the victim, you can't help but have it cross your mind that this dude is pissed off at you.

00:00:38
Speaker 2: Absolutely, because his sister speaking out, childhood best friends, cousins, anyone who was involved in the life of Cody Birchfield is concerned. And honestly, they're using words like terrified. and horrified. First of all, the fact that they're having to relive the nightmare of this murder. Second, because yes, they are concerned for their safety, their family's safety. And they have all spoken out saying this man has nothing to lose and he's capable of just about damn near anything. They're also upset. Get this. They say, Not one person called them to warn them, to tell them, to advise them. They found out that the murderer of their loved one escaped from prison from the news or other friends, not from any one official.

00:01:32
Speaker 1: That was on, do you know, I'm asking this because I'm trying to give the authorities a beat that we got a convicted murderer on the loose. And in all the chaos of trying to get that right, somebody didn't stop to think.

00:01:45
Speaker 2: Correct.

00:01:46
Speaker 1: That's possible, right? That's not okay. That should have been the first call.

00:01:51
Speaker 2: I would have thought that would have been the first call. I've seen pictures. Look, Cody Birchfield, the murder victim here, his sister was on the stand. If you've testified against a murderer and that murderer escapes from prison, yeah, you'd be pretty nervous. And we are talking about 28-year-old Jacob Morley, who is... By all accounts, police, authorities, the U.S. Marshal's office, everyone who's hunting him down, they have no idea where he is.

00:02:22
Speaker 1: Period. At least they're certainly not telling us, but I think they would tell. That's a weird thing to hear them say. Like, we don't have the trail. We don't know where to go. This was supposed to be a hot tip, right? This truck. They found the truck you stole. And now they're like, yeah. We don't think he's here anymore.

00:02:43
Speaker 2: But here's the deal. With all the talk about flock cameras, et cetera, and we thought, okay, he's got a very identifiable truck that he stole. So just to catch you up, I'm sure you all are pretty aware, but yes, we know that Jacob Morley escaped from the Northwest Correctional Complex in Tiptonville, Tennessee. That's in the northwest corner of the state, so it borders Kentucky and Missouri. They were warning folks in those states to be on the lookout. He is serving a life sentence, again, for the murder of Cody Birchfield. We know he breached a prison fence, stole this identifiable truck two miles from the prison. That was Sunday night. They found the truck abandoned Tuesday. And it was in Marion, Illinois, near the Shawnee National Forest. And they don't know why he's there.

00:03:30
Speaker 1: They say he doesn't have a reason to be. There's nothing, he has no ties in the area that they know of. They say it's possibly... Needed some gas, so he's on a busy highway. He needed to get off the highway. This is a good wooded area. They don't know. And Robes, are they taking flock cameras down? Robes, we can't. How is it? That's how they try. Well, again, go back to the, was it Brown University, the shootings?

00:03:54
Speaker 2: Yes.

00:03:55
Speaker 1: They followed this guy through every stoplight down the air.

00:03:59
Speaker 2: Yes, and the dentist and his wife who were murdered, they found her ex-husband and charged him. Yes, he drove across straight all the way to Illinois. And they found him through the flock cameras. So I'm just curious. Maybe they have it and they were holding it and they're not letting us know, but I haven't seen one image of him. one surveillance shot of the truck, of him, anywhere, only that they found the abandoned truck days later. And yes, right?

00:04:28
Speaker 1: It's Thursday.

00:04:29
Speaker 2: Yes, it's Thursday. And we have not seen or heard any word about where he might be. And so as you might imagine, the friends and family of his murder victim, yeah, they're speaking out. Carrie Norman is Cody's sister. And again, I saw pictures of her Testifying against this man, but she actually put this up on Facebook. when he first went missing earlier this week and said, I've been following this all day. I'm really disappointed with the justice system. Vine is a joke. Who notified me that a convicted murderer is on the loose? My best friend. Has the sheriff called to reassure the victims that he's working on keeping us safe?

00:05:08
Speaker 1: No.

00:05:09
Speaker 2: So my advice to everyone, lock your doors, load your guns, check your cameras, shoot first and ask questions last. I'm waiting for that call. that says what I want to hear.

00:05:20
Speaker 1: She grew up in Tennessee.

00:05:22
Speaker 2: Yeah. And that was her mindset. But she talked about reliving the tragedy all over again. She said it opened up everything that you thought you were able to grieve and process. It's all those feelings come rushing back and now having to prepare yourself and your family and let them know we have to be alert. We have to know our surroundings. We have to protect ourselves. And she went on to say he is a dangerous man Everyone needs to be aware he has nothing to lose. You said that from the very beginning.

00:05:59
Speaker 1: What do you do with it? He's out, Robes. He's out. And you know, his sentence is life. I think he has the possibility of parole.

00:06:07
Speaker 2: He did.

00:06:07
Speaker 1: I'm not sure how long, what minimum he has to do. And again, if there is a minimum other than He still has to go to a parole board and convince them to allow him to get out. This is not going to help his situation, and he knows that now. He's now never getting out of prison. And if, God forbid, if he hurts somebody while he's out, he might end up on death row.

00:06:30
Speaker 2: Correct. In Tennessee, that is correct. Although they've had some problems in Tennessee. Tennessee's had a tough month, a tough month. But, yeah, you're right. To that point, I hadn't thought about it. He did have the possibility of parole. He's 28 years old. I'm sure it was a very daunting This was a 2022 murder. He was put in prison within, I believe, three weeks after the murder. They found the body buried hidden underneath his home, and he was in prison. He's been in prison ever since. So he's probably served, what, three-plus years of his prison sentence now? But he had a long, long road ahead of him.

00:07:07
Speaker 1: At 28, that's another 60 years of your life, probably, looking ahead to be in that box.

00:07:14
Speaker 2: He ain't coming back.

00:07:16
Speaker 1: Robes, and maybe he's smart. Look, it's an exception for murderers. I'm not rooting for criminals. But it's your responsibility to not let them out. And there are some, I don't want to call them victimless crimes, or different folks who've escaped. You don't want to see some escaped person on the run. But at this point, Robes, that's all y'all. And to some degree, you've seen this certainly in movies, but sometimes in our culture, folks are rooting. For the guy that's on the run for one reason or another. Because you're kind of getting back at the man in some way. They're not doing their job, babe. The family should not be going, this is wrong. He is the criminal. He is the killer. Is it his fault he's out? My answer is no.

00:07:58
Speaker 2: No, it's the prison system's fault.

00:07:59
Speaker 1: Every single one of those guys in that prison, their job is to try to get out. Your job is to make sure it doesn't happen. It's certainly not the worst thing. Of the worst. This is on them. This is another bad road. This doesn't happen, right? You're not supposed to mess up an execution. And you're not supposed to, of all people, let a life... A lifer convicted of murder get out of prison. This is the Tennessee Department of Correction at work we have seen for the past several months.

00:08:30
Speaker 2: Yes, and there are a lot of people pointing the fingers squarely at them, obviously. And yes, this is so sad. Cody's friend, Diana, I thought she had a really good, she said, Diana Reed, she said, just knowing his killer is now on the run is terrifying. We don't know what he may be willing to do to avoid being captured. And that's what scares me the most. And I thought this was interesting. His childhood best friend, Daniel Russell, said this, talking about the murderer who's on the loose morally. He said, I was never going to have to see his face again. And then I wake up and it's everywhere for all of us to see again. And knowing he's out on the street. and he may do it to somebody else's family. If he kills somebody the way he killed Cody, he is a monster. He will do it again when the first opportunity comes. I mean, you can hear their real pain, their real fear, yes, at their own safety, but at other people's safety, wherever he is. And I hadn't thought about it. We talk about justice for victims. If someone gets sent to prison for the rest of their life, you actually take solace in the fact that you'll never have to hear their name or see their face again, for the most part.

00:09:56
Speaker 1: You're not going to pass them on the street either, walking down the sidewalk. That does give you, is supposed to give you some relief. Maybe these folks, this is, they have been once again, babe, once again, Tennessee is re-victimizing a family. Yes. There are several families, you could easily argue. Well, this is, look, stuff happens. I know there's probably good, people and goodwill people there in Tennessee. Bro, it is Thursday. That is a long time. How much of a heads up? Well, I saw when he got the truck. That was a couple hours later.

00:10:28
Speaker 2: Yes, that was at 1 a.m., I believe, on Monday morning. And every single person who has spoken out who is concerned, every single one of them have said, he would do this again. He's killed my cousin in cold blood. I wouldn't put it past him doing it again. Definitely watch out. People, be careful. That is from the cousin, Eric Mulder. He actually worked with Cody and Jacob. They all worked for the same pallet company. And he actually told the story where basically Jacob Morley, the guy who's on the run, the convicted murderer, he didn't have a car. And so his cousin, Cody, and everyone describes this young man as a father, a husband, and somebody who would give the shirt off of his back He was giving Jacob Morley rides to and from work because he didn't have a vehicle. That is why they actually became close. He said he got into a fight with Cody on, I guess, the Friday before he went missing. He was giving him a ride home from work. I mean, that just goes to show you somebody who is doing someone a solid, doing someone a favor, murders that person in cold blood and buries and hides their body under the house. That speaks to exactly what kind of person Jacob Morley is.

00:11:40
Speaker 1: What were they talking about? I mean, certainly they said in their warning, right, not to approach this person. Yes, they did. He is going to need help. Robes, he is going to need food. Where is he going to get it? He's going to have to steal it. If he's going to buy it, where is he going to get money? He's going to have to steal it. He is going to have to continue being a criminal. And the potential for people to get hurt is I would argue is high, Robes. He's got nothing to lose. Is he smart enough to just try to get the hell out of here? If you look at the map, right, Tiptonville to Marion, Illinois, it's almost a straight line, a straight shot north, a little northeast, I guess, but it's a straight shot up. Why did he go that way? Just because? Does he have a plan? Robes, the way he got out, how long has he been planning this? Maybe, did he just, That's pretty lucky to start walking from your prison and get lucky and look up on a... He just walked up on a truck two miles away that had the keys in it? Right?

00:12:41
Speaker 2: I know. How did he know about any of that? Was he surveilling areas around the prison before he was actually locked up? Or was there any sort of excursion where he could see, oh, look, there's a car? We don't know.

00:12:54
Speaker 1: But it is. He's the luckiest escapee ever.

00:12:57
Speaker 2: Annie? Yes. Or the most well-planned and... Did he hotwire? That's what I was wondering. They have not said how he was able to steal the vehicle, if the keys were in the car, if he hotwired it, if he knew how to.

00:13:09
Speaker 1: I thought that was only in the movies. Right. And they pull down the visor and the keys fall down. I've never in my life seen anybody do that.

00:13:16
Speaker 2: I haven't either. Are the keys around the tire? Yes. No, I have not seen that in real life ever. But when we come back, we're going to hear from one of the prison guards who recently worked for the Tennessee prison that Jacob Morley escaped from and the statistics on just how many prison escapes happen each year. You might be shocked and frightened to hear the answer. Welcome back everyone to Amy and TJ. Yes, it's pretty incredible and very frightening that 28 year old convicted murderer Jacob Morley is still on the run after escaping from a Tennessee prison on Sunday night in Tiptonville, Tennessee. We know the car he stole. was left and abandoned in Marion, Illinois, near the Shawnee National Forest, and that's where the trail went cold. And so a former guard at that very prison has been speaking out. And look, he said something that isn't shocking, but he told the local news station, yeah, that prison is understaffed and the employees are overworked. and underpaid. And he said, if the state does not step up and do something, I'm afraid this could possibly be a recurring event. And you know what? He's not an alarmist. There has been a lot of talk. A senior research scientist at the Center for Justice Research and Innovation said, I think if you ask any correctional authority, they would always say staffing is an issue. He's specifically talking about prison escapes. That being said, in the last couple of years, that issue has been exacerbated tenfold. Correctional agencies are severely understaffed. They're having a hard time not only hiring staff, but retaining them over the long term.

00:15:05
Speaker 1: That's always an issue. Lisa, I'm sure you've, all these small towns and whatnot and places we've covered have They always talk about retention, that turnover. That's a tough, tough, tough job to do day in, day out.

00:15:15
Speaker 2: It's a tough job. It's got a lot of risk and probably not a lot of reward, and it sounds like not a lot of pay. So that is a breeding ground for corruption, for disruption. We don't want to underpay and understaff prisons anymore. That's actually, like, that's wild to think about, why we would think that was an okay area to cut corners on.

00:15:47
Speaker 1: You want to pay additional taxes so we can get good pay to all these correctional facilities.

00:15:54
Speaker 2: So I can sleep at night?

00:15:56
Speaker 1: But that's the thing. Most people, right, we don't see them. We don't think about them. So if you come and tell me you want me to pay for them, this is the time to go after it right now. Because all the folks in Tennessee and Illinois are like, whatever y'all got to do to beef up, do it right now. especially what's going on in Tennessee. Most of these prisons, out of sight, out of mind. They're out in the middle of nowhere, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee, all these places. They're almost their own little communities. Oh, yes.

00:16:21
Speaker 2: You and I have visited many, many a prison that are holding maximum security murderers. That's usually who we're going to interview. And on the signs. Out of nowhere.

00:16:30
Speaker 1: The signs on the highway going out say, well, don't pick up hitchhikers.

00:16:34
Speaker 2: Yes.

00:16:35
Speaker 1: Isn't that crazy? Yes.

00:16:36
Speaker 2: But they deliberately put them, yes, out in cornfields, so to speak. But how about this? I was shocked to read this. There is no central federal database that keeps track of escapees.

00:16:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, we don't want to track that.

00:16:49
Speaker 2: We don't want to know.

00:16:50
Speaker 1: We don't want to track that.

00:16:51
Speaker 2: We don't want to know what we actually should know. But the John Jay College of Criminal Justice here in Manhattan, they say they estimate around 2,000 prisoners escape each year in the United States. However, the majority of them are people that are walking away from minimum security jails. We're talking halfway houses, certain community facilities where there's a minimum security. So they say it's like 68%. of prison escapees are from minimum security facilities. So this is an anomaly. I mean, not an anomaly, but it is rare to have a hardened murderer, that type of criminal on the loose. You know what?

00:17:31
Speaker 1: Give them credit. We do not have big stories of murderers just running around. Oftentimes people do get out. They are caught fairly quickly as well. And I was curious if you talked about how the minimum security and whatnot, a lot of them, it seems, because we've covered them, walk out on their prison dates, or when they're supposed to go to a courthouse. Every time they leave the prison, they find a way, and it's easier to slip away.

00:17:54
Speaker 2: In the transport of getting from one building to the next, suddenly, whoop, they disappear. Look, I don't know how much this will help. We talked about this when it first came out on Monday, when we first talked about the news, that they had put up a $ 2, 500 reward, and we were kind of laughing at that. Not a lot of money to snitch on somebody. Didn't really seem to be a compelling amount of money. They have increased the reward now. It's now $ 15, 000. So Governor Bill Lee, whose name we've talked about a lot recently, increased the reward to $ 10, 000 from the state of Tennessee. And then the U.S. Marshals pitched in another $ 5, 000. So, yeah, you've got U.S. Marshals. The feds are involved, obviously, because he has crossed state lines. And so now it's a federal issue as well as a Tennessee issue. But look, I can't imagine living near that area and feeling wildly afraid of the fact that no one knows where this man is.

00:18:49
Speaker 1: You don't think it's a big enough reward?

00:18:50
Speaker 2: $ 15, 000 still ain't that much. Okay. But it's better than $ 2, 500.

00:18:55
Speaker 1: But it makes the point, does it not? We are shortchanging giving you a financial incentive to keep an eye out because we broke. And you want to talk about paying prison guards more, hiring more to come on? This is just what this always is. Look, this is rare. I would like to know how many lifers actually break out of prison.

00:19:18
Speaker 2: Not many.

00:19:19
Speaker 1: Not a lot.

00:19:20
Speaker 2: No, movies are made about that kind of thing.

00:19:22
Speaker 1: Yeah. All right, we have to make something Hollywood of it. We just don't see it. But I'm very, very, I'm really curious to see how this works out and really what his motivation is. I can't.

00:19:33
Speaker 2: Is it?

00:19:34
Speaker 1: If you go through all this and you actually get away and you're almost a week on the run, don't come back and be stupid. Go live out your days. I'm not rooting for him. Please, no. This dude needs to be in prison. That's not what I'm saying. But I am hoping, Robes, he is not on a mission to do anything other than get away.

00:19:50
Speaker 2: Right. To just disappear rather than to exact any sort of revenge. I hear what you're saying. But we will obviously stay on top of the story. We always appreciate you listening to us, everyone. I'm Amy Robach alongside TJ Holmes. We will talk to you soon.