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Where Was Murder Suspect Bruce Day For Two Days?
October 9, 2009
(EXCLUSIVE) NorthEscambia.com has learned murder suspect Bruce Day traveled an area spanning over 100 miles during the time period between when he ran from U.S. Marshals in Pensacola Tuesday afternoon and his arrest Thursday night in Atmore.
When U.S. Marshals tried to serve the warrant on him Monday at the Crist Plant, he took off, prompting a massive manhunt and a campus lockdown of the University of West Florida.
Since that time, Escambia County (Ala.) Chief Deputy Mike Lambert said authorities in Alabama and Florida have followed up on dozens of leads and tips from the public. Authorities know of two locations were Day was definitively at over the past two days, Lambert said.
He said security footage from the Tom Thumb at Scenic Highway and Nine Mile Road in Pensacola shows Day buying cigarettes at 5:15 Wednesday morning. He was wearing short pants and leather boots, and he was soaking wet, Lambert said.
“He told the clerk that he had ‘one hell of a night’ in the swamp,” Lambert said. The store is located about a mile and a half from the Crist Plant, almost directly across Nine Mile Road from the Campus Drive entrance to UWF. The area between the Crist Plant and the store is a marshy swamp along the Escambia River.
Day’s next known location was in Alabama, over 100 miles away from that Tom Thumb.
Sheriff’s deputies from Monroe, Conecuh and Butler counties converged on an area near were the three Alabama counties intersect late Thursday after Day was spotted in a pickup truck with another man. Escambia County (Ala.) deputies were en route to that location Thursday night when Day surrendered at his father’s house in Atmore to Escambia County (Ala.) Sheriff Grover Smith.
Authorities were unsure how Day got from Pensacola to Monroe County, Ala. — a distance of about 100 miles. They were also not immediately sure how he made it to Atmore from Monroe County.
Sheriff’s deputies and U.S. Marshals worked almost non-stop over the two days that Day was on the run, following up a large number of leads from the public, Lambert said.
One such lead called into Escambia County (Ala.) authorities was from someone that though they spotted Day in North Escambia. The person saw someone entering the woods on Rockaway Creek Road just south of the Alabama state line. When an Atmore Police officer found the man, he was fishing. “He looked a lot like Day,” Lambert said, “but it wasn’t him.”
“The very lead that didn’t follow up on would be the one were we missed him; so we checked them all,” Lambert said. “The public’s help can be very important in a case like this.”
Click here for a related story about Day’s arrest.
Comments
11 Responses to “Where Was Murder Suspect Bruce Day For Two Days?”
., I don’t understand your comment, “the victim has made others his own victim”…what does that mean? Isn’t “the victim” presumed dead? Please explain.
Heard the same.
Yea, Im with you. I have heard that the “victim” has made others his own “victim” and Bruce Day is a good man, good Father and is NOT a dangerous man.
I wish Bruce Day all the luck in the world, may God be with you Bruce.
Maybe we need to form a Bruce Day support team!
By the way, Good Luck to you Bruce. . .you are in my thoughts.
To Pensacola Resident –
I have known Bruce for many years, although I haven’t talked to him or had any contact with him in quite a while.
When it was first released that he was “armed and dangerous” I knew that wasn’t possible. Not Bruce. Besides, if he was the “armed and dangerous” sort the news media and law enforcement made him out to be, how has it come to pass that he purchased a pack of cigarettes with no incident at a local Tom Thumb, around the area he was being sought at, and then made his “trek” 100 or so miles north, and back to his father’s residence, where he cooperatively turned himself in? He never even attempted to hurt/kidnap, or whatever else maliciously you might even have implied in your response.
And if the circumstances surrounding this case are based on “circumstantial” evidence, then so be it, it’ll all be played out. I don’t know the circumstances, and neither do you. We’ll just have to hear it all out in due time.
I do feel for him and his entire family. And like “Nokomis Resident” stated, don’t jump that bandwagon so fast! I do agree with that. Only limited amount of information given to general public from law enforcement and news media allows all to form opinions that are not supported by evidence. I, too, think it may be hard to convict a man under such circumstances. But I guess we shall all see in time.
There is so much about this story that people who are not familiar with this case do not know. The alleged victim is not someone most of us would want living next door. I have known Bruce for many years, and although he is not a saint, he has ALWAYS held down a job and been a productive member of society, in addition to being a Father to children who adore him.
Don’t jump on the bandwagon to convict Bruce just yet. So far, there is motive with no proof and I think the court will be hard pressed to find a jury of 12 who would convict a man for wanting to protect his family and property.
I know a good bit about the circumstances of this too. Good Luck Bruce!
The helicopter held him away from the campus where he might have hurt/kidnapped/whatever someone else. Pull up a Google map of the area. There’s a whole lot of really THICK woods in that swamp. It would be like finding a needle in the haystack.
I believe that he got help, this distance from where he started to where he turned him self in was to for to travel in this short time.
Goes to show that the helicopters are not the end-all, save-all pieces of equipment so many people made them out to be. Certainly not valuable enough to justify the $850,000 annual operating costs they were previously costing the county. Once again another fine decision by Sherrif Morgan and good to know that they are still available should we need them in cases of emergency such as this.
I’m disappointed that US Marshals and two counties’ sheriff’s departments, with dogs and helicopters, couldn’t track a guy through the woods, in the swamp, from the Crist Plant to Tom Thumb on Scenic Highway. I live in this neighborhood! If he was at that Tom Thumb, and wet, it means he came down the Escambia River, below the bluff at UWF. He’d still be on the run if he hadn’t gone to his father’s house!