Henderson residents relieved hunt for Bradley Gillespie is over

HENDERSON, Ky. (WFIE) - On May 28, Henderson Police confirmed the five day manhunt for Bradley Gillespie came to a close after they pulled his body out of the Ohio River, allowing local residents like Nancy Horn to breathe a little easier.

“I felt like probably he was hiding in the bushes up here somewhere because there’s a lot of wooded area up here that somebody could hide in and not be seen,” says Horn. “They caught him yesterday thankfully, and he wasn’t able to put up a fight.”

[READ: Henderson Police: Bradley Gillespie’s body recovered in river]

While Henderson was on the lookout for five days, the hunt for Gillespie actually lasted six days and spanned three states.

Starting out on Tuesday in Lima, Ohio at Allen-Oakwood Correctional Institution, Gillespie and another prisoner, James Lee, escaped through a dumpster.

Just west of that, police in Delphos, Ohio confirmed on social media the two men may have been held up in town for a moment.

After that, we know the two men make their way down south, through Indiana, to our next sighting at a Rural King in Vincennes.

That’s where officials confirm the two men broke into a woman’s car in the parking lot.

Leaving Vincennes, they move further south down to Evansville, where there’s video of the two men walking through the parking lot of the West Side Home Depot.

Finally, the running came to an end in Henderson over on Camaro Court, where authorities say the two men crashed their car into a fence, with Lee getting caught by police but Gillespie getting away.

That crash kicked off five days of law enforcement and first responders searching on land, water, and through the air, hoping to find Gillespie.

Early on in the hunt, law enforcement believe they had found one of Gillespie’s shoes on the boat ramp near the Ohio River.

As theories swirled around about where he may have gone, with local residents locking their doors and calling in tips around the area, only time would show law enforcement that the search would end close to where it started.

“We always knew the river could be a possibility. We never ruled that out,” explains Henderson Police Chief Sean McKinney. “We always knew that was a mode of transportation that he could’ve used to leave the area. He was last seen very close to the river.”

As for the people of Henderson, life goes on, albeit quieter than the last couple of days.

“Well it’s just calm and peaceful, and all is right with the world again. Everybody’s going up and down the river and just sitting here enjoying it,” says Horn. “Like it was a bad dream.”

James Lee is scheduled to be in court Tuesday.

Right now, he’s in the Henderson County Jail on several charges.

He is being held on a $500,000.

It is not known when Lee will be extradited back to Ohio.

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