WASHINGTON—A convicted drug trafficker serving a 5.5-year sentence is facing new charges after escaping from a federal prison in North Carolina, claiming that he feared contracting COVID-19, the respiratory illness caused by the CCP virus.
Robert Higdon, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina, announced on Tuesday that Richard Cephas turned himself in on April 20 to a federal courthouse in Delaware, about 18 days after escaping from the federal prison complex in Butner, North Carolina.
