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Status Anxiety

Toby Young

Wednesday, 28th May 2008

My other life as a killer on the run with my lover comes to an end in Tennessee

I began to wonder what mysterious hold my doppelganger had over the ‘Dog Lady’. One clue was provided the next day: ‘Officials release photos of escaped inmate’s tattoos’. At this stage, the killer and his accomplice were still at large, but, according to a headline on 19 February, it didn’t look good for the dog trainer: ‘Prison affairs fizzle or flame out; when a woman helps a man break out of prison, she risks her life and livelihood, often with love as the motive’.

Sure enough, the story took a dramatic turn on 25 February: ‘Fugitives nabbed in Tennessee: Lansing inmate, woman volunteer are apprehended after chase’. In case there was any doubt, a headline on 27 February confirmed that love was indeed the motive: ‘Fugitives’ Cabin Fever; A peek inside their temporary home in the woods reveals romance’.

Now, of all the headlines to appear so far, that was the most beguiling. What was it about their cabin hideaway in the woods of Tennessee that revealed ‘romance’? Soiled sheets? A pair of panties ripped in half? At this point, I have to confess, I was getting a slight sexual thrill from the story. I could imagine myself in the place of this other ‘Toby Young’, tearing off my shirt to reveal a glistening array of tattoos as the ‘Dog Lady’ knelt before me.

You can imagine my confusion, therefore, when I read the following headline on 3 March: ‘Toby Young to appear on charge of helping inmate escape’. Come again?!? Surely, a prisoner cannot be charged with aiding and abetting his own escape? I decided the time had come to shell out $1.50.

I quickly discovered that my doppelganger was not the convicted killer, but the ‘Dog Lady’. The other Toby Young, it turned out, was a 48-year-old mother-of-two who ran the Safe Harbor Prison Dogs programme at the Lansing Correctional Facility. It was here that she met and fell in love with John ‘Hooligan’ Michael Manard, a 27-year-old inmate whom she smuggled out of prison in a white van. The two fugitives were caught 12 days later in a remote fishing village. Poor Toby Young, who claimed she was suffering from depression at the time of the escape, was sentenced to two-and-a-half years and was released last week after serving 21 months. During her incarceration, her husband filed for divorce and her father died. She has yet to be reconciled with her two grown-up sons.

Toby Young is associate editor of The Spectator.