Killer who escaped NC prison farm recaptured

RALEIGH, N.C. — A convicted killer who walked away from a North Carolina prison farm has been recaptured after more than four days on the run.

   A spokesman for the North Carolina Department of Public Safety said Thursday that inmate James J. Ladd was taken into custody by correctional officers and Alcohol Law Enforcement agents in Halifax County. No other details were immediately available.

   Ladd was first noticed missing Sunday morning after the tractor he had been operating was found abandoned in a field outside the minimum security Tillery Correctional Center, more than an hour's drive east of Raleigh.

   The 51-year-old inmate is serving three life sentences for the 1980 robbery and shooting deaths of two men. He became eligible for parole after serving 30 years but was denied release in January 2011.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

WSOC