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Girl on the Run: The Hunt for Americas Most Wanted Woman - Season 1 - Episode 01: Run Sarah Run
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00:07Rockville is a maximum security facility.
00:11You've got a very tall fence with razor wire, rows and rows of razor wire.
00:18There are towers and there's a guard that's armed that drives around the perimeter.
00:28There were around about 1,200 inmates there.
00:31Whether it was because it was all women, they just didn't cause any problems.
00:44On August the 4th, 2008, an ordinary day, you just kind of wake up and everybody has their own routine.
00:55They run at least three visual body counts a day.
01:01You had to be on your bunk and show skin for the count.
01:10We got counted and then the count ran over. Not abnormal.
01:19And they counted us again.
01:23And that's when you, you know, you really start to think, what is going on that they can't count for?
01:29Where would somebody be?
01:31The count was bad. We had two bad counts to verify all the empty beds.
01:36At 4 o'clock, they had one missing.
01:41Very, very unusual.
01:43Try to verify where the offenders are, where they should be.
01:47The sergeants, the bigwigs, they come in, start counting, stomping around, huffy-puffy.
01:55They were mad.
01:56Go up to room eye, check around the offenders' bed area and see if perhaps you might be hiding in
02:02the locker.
02:04And then about a half an hour goes by and you could just, like, hear the whispers across the dorm.
02:16Unable to locate her on the facility grounds.
02:20Somebody said, Sarah's not in her bed.
02:24And I just got a little twinge of excitement in my stomach and I said, she did it.
02:35She got out of here.
02:38Sarah Pender just vanished.
02:41You know, we got to get her back.
02:42She's already killed two people.
02:44Who knows what she's going to do next?
02:45Tonight, a convicted killer is on the loose.
02:49A woman escaped from the Rockville Correctional Facility.
02:52A Marion County jury convicted Sarah Pender in the year 2000 in a double murder.
02:57Along with her then-boyfriend, Richard Hall, she helped kill a man and a woman and then stashed their bodies
03:02in a dumpster.
03:03She has a Charles Manson-like ability to manipulate people in committing crimes.
03:09She looks like a sweet little innocent girl.
03:13But within, there's a deep, evil demon.
03:28Hi. My name is Sarah Pender.
03:35Okay, wait a minute.
03:36My name is Sarah Pender.
03:38People have called me a manip...
03:40People have called me all sorts of names.
03:43They've said that I'm a manipulator.
03:45That I'm psychologically...
03:47I'm a psychopath.
03:52Stop looking at me.
03:53This is gonna be it.
03:54People have called me a manipulator.
03:57Pathological.
04:11Every inmate thinks about escaping prison, especially when you have a lot of time.
04:19I was sent to prison for 110 years for two murders that I did not commit.
04:25I knew that I was going to die in prison.
04:33And then one day, I thought, I bet I could get out of here.
04:45I knew that I would need help.
04:49Even if I made it past the guards or through the fence, I would need someone there to pick me
04:55up.
04:57So I definitely needed a partner to help me out.
05:02And then I found one.
05:05Once the gate was open, I remember walking across the pavement and it being so hot.
05:15I was so excited.
05:18I was never going back.
05:23This is what I've been waiting for, so don't flake out now.
05:33I remember looking and seeing cows in the pasture, driving through small towns, looking at all the buildings and small
05:43structures, wondering what all those little people were doing in their little lives and how they had no idea what
05:50was happening.
05:52I felt completely refreshed.
05:55And I remember hitting the dashboard and just bop, bop, bop, bop, bop, bop, bop.
06:01And I was like, I'm free!
06:10I was down in Florida and I get a phone call and it was Sarah.
06:21And then it dawned on me, well, normally when she would call me from prison, the operator comes on and
06:28that didn't come on and it was Sarah's voice.
06:30And I was like, well, where are you calling me from?
06:35I'm on a cell phone and I'm on the road.
06:41And that just threw me for a total loop.
06:46I was standing there with my mouth open like, did she just tell me she walked out of prison?
06:58I'm living out on the West Coast.
07:00The phone rings and it's Bonnie, Sarah's mom, and Sarah had escaped and she was gone.
07:12110 years, that's what the judge sentenced Sarah to.
07:18Sarah was 21 when she was arrested.
07:22She had her whole life in front of her.
07:28Growing up, she's a joyful child.
07:31Her and her sister, Jennifer, we were living in Greenfield.
07:35It's a small town east of Indianapolis.
07:40She was kind and considerate, intelligent.
07:49She just amazed me at how quickly that she just learned.
07:53It was like she was two grades higher than what she was.
08:02Years later and, you know, now Sarah graduated from high school.
08:07And they got the news we'd been accepted at Purdue.
08:10It was a joyous time.
08:16She went straight into biophysics, biochemistry, trigonometry, and calculus.
08:25I was lucky that my father was very interested in my education
08:30because he knew that education was one of the number one things
08:34that would help create success in life.
08:43She hadn't even really got started in her life.
08:47And now, your daughters are on the run from the law.
08:53Well, how can this be?
08:56It just doesn't make any sense.
09:05I can't believe she's sitting next to me in this vehicle and we're driving away.
09:13Things were just right.
09:16From movements that particular day to who was on the gate that day.
09:25I met Jamie in county jail.
09:29What started as a sexual relationship became a deep friendship between us.
09:35And now, Jamie had already been out of jail for quite some time.
09:40She already had this free life that she was risking for me.
09:45But I trusted that she would be there whenever I got out.
09:52One of the things that made me fall in love with Jamie was she was very defiant.
09:59And I admired her guts.
10:03Jamie was down for anything.
10:07She liked risks.
10:09And she liked me.
10:12You know what? I'm going to be perfectly honest with you.
10:15I told her, don't look back.
10:17I loved her enough to let her go.
10:20You want her to stay out free?
10:22Yeah, yeah, I do.
10:24You want her to be free forever?
10:25Yeah, I do.
10:29Run, Sarah, run.
10:42Now, Sarah Pender is described as a white female.
10:45Five foot eight, weighing about 200 pounds, with brown hair and blue eyes.
10:50Police say they are tracking Pender and she should be considered dangerous.
10:55Jamie dropped me off at the safe house and left to get me clean clothes and hair dye, a new
11:05cell phone, my money.
11:08We are going to use every resource to hunt her down and find her.
11:13There were a lot out physically looking.
11:15The entire Department of Corrections, Homeland Security, we didn't know what she was going to do.
11:21It's concerning because we don't know where this woman is.
11:26You know, we don't know what she's capable of.
11:28I live about seven miles south and there's woods all around there, so that's always been a concern.
11:36We didn't have any evidence of how she got out.
11:40She didn't breach the parameter.
11:43She didn't go over the fence or anything.
11:46There's only one conclusion, that she went out through a gate.
11:51To do that, she had to have an accomplice, a correctional officer.
11:56They reviewed a lot of tapes and they come up with a primary suspect.
12:01Scott Spitler, the correctional officer, because he went out about the time that she had gotten out.
12:09I know the Spitler guy has to be the one that did it.
12:14I said, I want to see him.
12:17I got him in an interview room.
12:20I asked him if he would take a voice stress test.
12:23And he said, yes.
12:25It's a lie detector of sorts.
12:27I mean, he was nervous.
12:30He was stuttering.
12:31Guilt was pouring out of him.
12:34He failed it.
12:36Badly.
12:37Real bad.
12:39And finally he confessed.
12:41He told us everything about how he helped her get out.
12:50Planning my escape took several months.
12:54I knew that I would need money once I got out.
12:57So, I began to watch and pay attention, consider and look for opportunities.
13:09I identified Scott Spitler and I befriended him.
13:15I would pay him to bring in contraband.
13:19Cell phones, tobacco, Benadryl.
13:23I sent the money that I made to my friend Jamie.
13:30Jamie held the money aside so that I would have it whenever I got out.
13:35And at this point, Scott saw an opportunity to make even more money because he knew how to get me
13:45out.
13:45He asked me for $15,000 in order for him to drive me to the parking lot.
13:52And I agreed.
13:55But as time went on, Scott wanted to have sex with me.
14:01It's not like I have a choice.
14:05And so, I did what I had to do.
14:12Scott Spitler told me about utilizing a van and went through the back gates and let her out in the
14:19front parking lot where Jamie, a long time friend of Sarah's, picked her up.
14:27I saw Scott as a means to an end.
14:30Before I got out of the van, I said, Scott, I love you and I will text you later.
14:37And Scott said, you better.
14:41She never called.
14:44And I told her, I said, looks pretty obvious to you.
14:46You got took.
14:49She had the ability to bring people into her.
14:55I've never seen an inmate like that before.
14:5841-year-old Scott Spitler.
15:00He is now in jail, facing seven charges, including assisting a criminal, official misconduct and sexual misconduct.
15:07I have no idea what he was thinking.
15:09If he was manipulated, she is, should be considered dangerous.
15:16When we got Jamie's name out of Spitler, immediately we go to the visitation records.
15:23We saw Jamie Long's name everywhere.
15:28We looked to see how many times she had been there, what her last visit was, what her address was.
15:37So we got an emergency response team to Jamie's house.
15:44So we had a very brief interview with Jamie.
15:48And she didn't give up any information.
15:52I looked at my phone.
15:55Jamie texted me.
15:57An officer had talked to her.
16:01She was afraid to come to the house because she didn't want to leave them to me.
16:09I needed my money to move on.
16:14I don't know what to do. What do I do? What do I do?
16:18And, you know, we didn't waste any time.
16:21And the commissioner called U.S. Marshals Task Force.
16:28She was going to get caught, and you're going to come back, and nobody's going to care about you anymore.
16:40Sarah Penner was the first inmate to ever escape from this prison, and they hope she's the last.
16:46Over my three years working with U.S. Marshals, I caught hundreds of murderers.
16:51Not dozens, hundreds.
16:54Were professionals.
16:57Every 24 hours, I'd get a phone call.
17:01I was accustomed to getting the next bad guy or the next bad girl.
17:07Typically, we catch them pretty quick.
17:11Department of Corrections, they said that we had a female breakout.
17:15It wasn't like, oh, this is an interesting case.
17:19It means she escaped from prison.
17:21I don't get that, like, emotional towards it.
17:23It's just another fucking fugitive.
17:25She was driven outside the gates by correctional officer Scott Spindler.
17:28But also, it wasn't that she robbed a bank.
17:32She killed two people and put them in a dumpster.
17:34She's a risk to the public.
17:37Would she kill again?
17:39Probably.
17:40Would she want to go back?
17:42Probably not.
17:43It's a pretty high-level danger situation.
17:48There's no better thrill than the hunting of mankind.
17:52You know, the intellectual being who can think, who's trying to outthink you.
17:56Now, is that thrilling?
17:57You better fucking believe it's thrilling.
18:0729-year-old Sarah Pender is still on the run after breaking out of the Rockville Correctional Facility.
18:12She's certainly a dangerous individual, has the ability and the capability of killing.
18:17The news came on, and they said that Sarah Pender had escaped.
18:22My heart sank.
18:25The first time I met Sarah was in the Marion County Jail.
18:29She was coming in there for a double murder.
18:33It's like, I'm thinking some crazy-looking lady's going to come in.
18:36And she came in, and she was just a normal person.
18:40She was young.
18:42She was really nervous, and I helped her, you know, get settled in.
18:46She was like a daughter.
18:51She's a good person that she didn't do anything that she's accused of.
18:58She wouldn't hurt anybody.
19:05She wouldn't hurt a fly.
19:08No.
19:12She called me.
19:15I just knew in my heart that I had to help her.
19:18Whatever I could do, I had to help her.
19:23When I got into Peggy's car, I think that the first thing that she said to me was,
19:29Oh, my God, I can't believe you're out.
19:34I knew that she would help me get the money from Jamie to do whatever I needed to do.
19:49When the Department of Corrections shared with me that Jamie Long had helped her,
19:53you know that's a hell of a lead.
19:57Grab her gear, her radios, her attack best.
20:00I needed me to talk to her.
20:07Jamie was more scared than I was, so she decided to deliver the money undercover at a McDonald's.
20:18It was a risk.
20:21But without that, I knew that I was in trouble.
20:28Even though the police were on Jamie's tail, we had already committed that far.
20:34So, what's one more step?
20:44I was hoping that the police had not connected Peggy to me yet, even if they were following Jamie.
20:53However, I can't just be sitting in the back of Peggy's car.
20:58And so I climbed into her trunk.
21:05I remember feeling jumper cables digging into my back, and it was so hot and stuffy.
21:14But it was what I had to do.
21:18Having that money is essential to the rest of the plan.
21:23I'm driving, and I'm just, you know, checking on my mirrors, thinking, oh my God, are the police following me?
21:30I could have went back to prison.
21:32I was nervous.
21:36Told Jamie that I'd meet her in the bathroom at a certain time.
21:42I felt the car stop.
21:45The engine shut off.
21:47The door open and close.
21:52I walked in, and I looked all around, you know, scoping out the people that was in the restaurant.
22:00I got to the bathroom.
22:01I seen some feet underneath the stall.
22:06And I said, Jamie?
22:10She said, yeah.
22:13I said, okay, I'm Peggy, you know.
22:15So I went in the next stall beside her, and she handed me the money underneath the little partition wall
22:21there.
22:24And then when I came out of the bathroom, went up to the counter,
22:28and then that's when I seen Jamie come out of the bathroom and leave the McDonald's.
22:40Jamie went home.
22:44Peggy got in the car, and we backed out of the parking space.
22:55So I took her to Motel 8 on Shadeland.
23:04When I gave Sarah the money, I think she was a little bit disappointed.
23:13Jamie only gave me $350.
23:17I was expecting about $3,500.
23:22Jamie was afraid to bring the full amount.
23:26She was really worried about, you know, getting caught.
23:31And now, I just had to wait, hoping that she would give me the rest of the money at a
23:39later date.
23:42But my gut emotion was fear.
23:46I knew that the possibility was there for her to be arrested.
24:08I went straight to Jamie's house.
24:12And she came to the door.
24:14You could see that she was concerned.
24:21I identified myself with the U.S. Marshals.
24:24She was, I had nothing to say, basically out of the box.
24:29She wasn't cooperative.
24:30I was very open and honest with Jamie.
24:31Hey, Jamie, you know you're in trouble.
24:33And you know you're going to, you know, Spittler is already arrested,
24:36but it's going to happen.
24:37You know it's going to happen.
24:40But she told me, she goes,
24:43I don't know where she's at.
24:44She's somewhere on the east side of Indianapolis.
24:45I can call her for you.
24:48Did that surprise me?
24:51It did, but I was rolling with it.
24:58The phone rang.
25:01And it was Jamie.
25:03She answered.
25:06I knew something was off immediately.
25:14Jamie sounded panicked.
25:18She had a lot more to lose than I did.
25:22Now, the conversation was not free-flowing.
25:25Jamie's like, what's up, Sarah?
25:28How you doing?
25:30She said that she needed to meet me in the parking lot where she dropped me off.
25:35I knew that she hadn't dropped me off in the parking lot, so I told her,
25:39okay, well, I'm already out at the farm.
25:42And Sarah was like, well, I'm waking up at the farmhouse.
25:45It's nice to have breakfast with the farmer out in the country.
25:49It was weird stuff.
25:51Right away, I thought, they're playing games.
25:55I knew that either the police were there or they were listening in.
26:01But then Sarah hung up.
26:05It was very quick.
26:07My profile of her started to formulate that she's not stupid, she's very smart,
26:11and that she's controlling her communications now, and she's not sloppy with it.
26:15This is going to be a challenge.
26:19It was frustrating because, you know, Jamie here was still not cooperative.
26:25So how do I get her to cooperate with me?
26:27I want her to really grasp onto, you know, I'm fucked.
26:32She had a husband with her inside, a very old, frail man.
26:36His name was Larry.
26:38You could tell that he was on his last weeks of life, and she was caring for him.
26:44He had oxygen and medicines everywhere, but that was good
26:49because I knew that she was his caregiver.
26:54And I told him, I said, Jamie, you will get charged.
26:57I understand that.
26:59But I won't lock her up right now if you can get her to help me.
27:04And he was nervous.
27:05He was like, yeah, but she's not going to cooperate with you.
27:09I said, well, you need to talk some fucking sense into her.
27:11I mean, she's your caregiver.
27:13I mean, you don't want to lose your caregiver, do you?
27:16And he goes, no.
27:17And he cried.
27:20And then Jamie had a different tone with me.
27:24She was very, very scared.
27:27She said, follow me upstairs.
27:30I went upstairs in her room, and she gave me a shoebox.
27:34And the shoebox had all the money in there that Sarah wanted to get.
27:41That was a huge thing to give to me because right away that, you know, we took off her means.
27:46We got something that she really needed.
27:51I mean, she was choked.
27:53Who's she going to turn to?
27:54I mean, now what?
28:00Deputy Prosecutor Larry Sells once called Sarah Jo Pender the female Charles Manson.
28:06When I was in the hotel, I changed phones.
28:10I broke the old phone and started up the new.
28:20I cut my hair significantly shorter and dyed it a darker color.
28:31And that's when I started thinking about all the things that I wish I had done differently.
28:40All the choices that I made that I regret.
28:49Once I went off to college, I did not spend enough time on my studies.
28:57And so my grades suffered.
29:01I had failed enough to where I decided not to go back.
29:09I felt ashamed that I could not complete college.
29:14I did not have an excuse because I knew that I was smart enough.
29:20But despite the fact I was academically talented, I did not feel a great sense of self-worth from it.
29:29And my self-worth really came from making other people happy.
29:35I think that started after my mom left.
29:43When Sarah was six, Rowland and I sat there and tried to explain that I wasn't going to be there.
29:51We were going to divorce.
29:56I didn't have anything to offer him at the time.
29:59And so I let him have the children until I could better myself.
30:10Sarah never got in trouble growing up, but I think it was difficult.
30:16It was very difficult on her.
30:18And there wasn't much of anything available in the way of any kind of support.
30:24They didn't understand why I wasn't there.
30:29My mother leaving created a sense of abandonment.
30:36And so by the time I was 20, I was afraid of being alone.
30:43I wanted someone to be there to help me navigate life and also to love me.
30:51That was certainly the case at the time that I met Rick.
30:58Pender was serving time for a double murder in Marion County back in 2000.
31:02Police came to believe that 22-year-old Richard Hall was the likely murderer.
31:07Hall eventually was sentenced to 90 years in prison.
31:10Investigators thought she was the brains behind the killing.
31:20If I could go back from the very first time that I met Sarah, I would just leave.
31:29I mean, it cost me my family being with her.
31:35So, no, yeah, there's, yeah, I would definitely leave.
31:41We could always play the what if game.
31:44What if I would have turned left to set it to turn right?
31:47You know, I could do that all day and beat myself up all day.
31:58But I actually, at one point in time, I could say that I did love her.
32:06What attracted me to Sarah was her personality that she had.
32:10She was fun.
32:11She had a good heart then.
32:13I mean, we had a good relationship, I guess.
32:17I mean, it was, things kind of was a blur and happened so fast.
32:24When I met Rick, he was both manly and sensitive.
32:31Rick put his arm around me and he said, stick with me, kid, and I'll take care of you.
32:36And it felt so good.
32:45Sarah told me, well, I have a boyfriend.
32:51And I said, oh?
32:53I said, where'd the boyfriend come from?
32:56Is he from Purdue, too, and that?
32:58And she goes, no.
33:00She told me his name was Richard Hall.
33:05I said, is he good to you?
33:08She said, yes, Mom.
33:10And he loves me.
33:12And he's my protector.
33:17In the beginning, Rick told me that he worked at a carpet cleaning business.
33:28It wasn't long after that that I found out that his real job was dealing drugs.
33:34When she first met me, she knew I was into the, you know, business, into the drug business.
33:40So it wasn't like a huge surprise to her.
33:42You know, I mean, that's what we were out there doing was having a big old party.
33:51I was very smitten.
33:52And I felt like it was an adventure.
34:05After a few weeks together, Rick told me that his friend Drew and Drew's girlfriend Trish were traveling from Nevada
34:17and needed a place to stay for a little while.
34:22Rick made it clear that the less that I knew, the better off that I was.
34:28They looked like any too normal, hippie couple.
34:35We found a house on South Meikle Street.
34:38We all moved in together.
34:41I had no frame of reference for what might happen.
34:47All I knew was that I wanted to be loved and to stay in that loving relationship.
34:57I really had this vision that we would move to the suburbs and get a small house, a picket fence,
35:05a dog.
35:06You know, start living the American dream, just like anyone else.
35:12But it was like two different worlds.
35:16I would party with Rick on the weekends and then sober up on Sunday and go to work on Monday.
35:23While I went to work at a construction company, Drew and Rick would deal drugs.
35:36We actually used to drive around Indianapolis and throughout Noblesville.
35:42And if you've ever seen a movie Fear and Loathing Las Vegas with Johnny Depp,
35:47when they're carrying around a little suitcase full of drugs, you know, a briefcase full of drugs, that was us.
35:54You know, I used to tell people, man, we got uppers, downers, iners, outers and all arounders, whatever you want,
35:59it's there, you know.
36:04I didn't get good vibes.
36:07I thought, okay, they're dealing drugs.
36:12It frightened me a little.
36:15I just had this tremendous urge to put her in the car, take off.
36:26And you have that overwhelming feeling.
36:30I need to get her out of here.
36:33But it didn't turn out that way.
36:40The victims, a white man and a woman, were discovered last night in a dumpster behind the Teamsters Hall in
36:46the 800 block of South Meridia.
36:4825-year-old Andrew Cataldi, he and his girlfriend, 26-year-old Trisha Nordman, had been shot to death.
36:56Investigators knew to search their house on South Michael Street.
37:00Police think that's where the couple died.
37:06Two hours ago, a U.S. Marshal-led task force apprehended Indiana's second most wanted suspect.
37:12The alleged person who drove the getaway car bore a twice-convicted killer.
37:16Ma'am, anything you want to say about your situation?
37:20Did you drive Sarah Pender from prison?
37:23The marshals arrested 42-year-old Jamie Long on a charge of aiding an escape.
37:29Jamie knew the consequences.
37:34That loyalty and obedience is mind-blowing, it's bizarre.
37:40But she was that madly in love with her.
37:46I'm not the first person who says that Sarah Pender is a manipulator.
37:50There's a common theme, she gets people to do things that aren't normal.
37:56She gets people to do things that land them in prison.
38:07I needed intelligence.
38:10There was one piece of evidence that was given to me very early on,
38:13is they gave me the phone number of the phone that she had while she was in prison.
38:18I got the cell phone records.
38:21I saw the name Peggy.
38:24She was up there in the top ten.
38:28Peggy's address came back to house in Indianapolis.
38:37You know, you lived in the neighborhood all your life, you know, your neighbors.
38:42There was a strange truck parked down the street.
38:50And then me and my daughter left.
38:54And I noticed that truck was following us.
39:03Me and my daughter pulled up at my sister's house.
39:06The truck pulled up behind us in the driveway.
39:09And then when I actually got out of the car,
39:12I looked and I seen the street was full of cop cars.
39:19And then the marshal,
39:23they all had their guns out.
39:27I was frightened.
39:30I told my daughter to get in the house.
39:33Don't stop.
39:34And they tried.
39:35They yelled at her and told her to stop.
39:36And I told her, no, you get in the house.
39:39You know why?
39:41That's what they paid me to do.
39:42You can't be a pussy and do this.
39:44Get up, bro.
39:46Because you can't handle these people with the soft kid gloves.
39:49You can't.
39:51U.S. Marshal Ryan Harmon.
39:56He just portrayed himself to be just like a big bad guy.
40:05Like, you know, I'm going to get your friend no matter what.
40:10They went in and searched upstairs and downstairs looking for Sarah.
40:18They didn't look like they were too happy that they couldn't find her there.
40:25They asked me if I knew where Sarah Pender was.
40:32I was a nervous wreck.
40:35Because I didn't know.
40:38I didn't know what to say or really do.
40:43Peggy was a very wiry, nervous, oh shit kind of person.
40:56Which was good.
40:57Just do what's right.
41:03Wow, this brings up a lot of memories.
41:06And she did.
41:11I was laying on the bed and I was thinking that I had to get out of that motel room.
41:20Suddenly there was a knock on the door.
41:24My heart dropped to the floor.
41:27Nobody would be knocking on the door.
41:29I don't want to go back to prison.
41:33I thought, holy shit.
41:35I had to do it.
41:37It was, oh shit.
42:01And it broke from me.
42:04I went last night, though I couldn't be effet totally.
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