Jacob Allen Morley has been captured near Kansas City, Missouri, after more than a week on the run following his escape from a Tennessee prison, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation announced Tuesday, November 3. The agency thanked the public for its assistance and said it would release further details as they became available. The circumstances of Morley’s arrest were not immediately clear.
Morley, 28, escaped from the Northwest Correctional Complex in Lake County on the evening of October 25, according to the Associated Press. Investigators said surveillance footage showed him taking a truck belonging to a local farming business around 1 a.m. the next day. The vehicle was later found abandoned in Marion, Illinois, where Morley was last seen at a Pilot Travel Center on the morning of October 26.
Authorities described Morley as dangerous during the search. A reward for information leading to his arrest had risen to $17,500 while he remained at large.
Morley was serving a life sentence for the killing of his co-worker, Cody Birchfield. Court records cited by NBC News show Morley was convicted in 2025 of murder, abuse of a corpse, tampering with evidence and aggravated burglary. Birchfield’s body was found in a metal box buried beneath Morley’s home in March 2022, according to court filings reviewed by the outlet.
Sources: Us Weekly.