William Leslie “Les” Arnold is one of four Nebraska prison
escapees never caught who still might be alive today.
The next-youngest, according to longtime Nebraska prison records
administrator Ron Riethmuller, is a decade older than Arnold, who
was born Aug. 28, 1942.
Robert Ross, who escaped from the Nebraska State Penitentiary in
1965, is 74, if he’s still living.
Thomas Kane, who escaped from the old state men’s reformatory,
would be 77.
Juanita Towne, who escaped from the women’s prison in 1957,
would be 82.
Riethmuller said he occasionally hears someone in the department
mention Arnold’s name.
“It’s just once in a while, but William Arnold never seems to
quite go away.”
Riethmuller was interested to hear the story told recently by
the Rev. Jim Child, who says he helped Arnold and inmate James
Harding get out of Nebraska after escaping from the penitentiary in
1967.
“It’d sure play on my mind if I’d done something like that. It
wasn’t the right thing to do. I’d be thinking that if I were
looking back at it. But he was probably young at the time,
too.”
Child, 68, isn’t likely to face charges for coming forward with
his story.
Lancaster County Attorney Gary Lacey says there’s a three-year
statute of limitations on aiding and abetting an escape.
