Associated Press
LUFKIN, Texas (AP) -- A suspect in the murder of an elderly Oklahoma couple who eluded police for weeks was finally arrested in Texas after he kidnapped another couple and the husband shot and wounded him, authorities said.
The capture of Scott James Eizember on Sunday brought a sense of relief to law officers who had searched in vain for the 42-year-old suspect. It was one of the longest manhunts in Oklahoma history.
“This is what we’ve been looking for,” Creek County Deputy Michael O’Keefe said late Sunday. “We’re very elated at this point that the search is over with.”
Eizember was accused of killing A.J. Cantrell, 76, and his wife, Patsy Cantrell, 70, on Oct. 18 in Depew, Okla., in the northeastern part of the state.
He is also accused of beating Carla Wright, a neighbor of the Cantrells, and wounding her grandson, 16-year-old Tyler Montgomery, that same day. Wright’s daughter Kathy Biggs, Tyler’s mother, is Eizember’s former girlfriend, and authorities believe he had been stalking her.
Eizember managed to elude teams of law enforcement officers who combed through dense woods in between Oklahoma City and Tulsa.
Law enforcement agencies picked up Eizember’s trail Sunday morning after he was spotted by a volunteer at the Depew Methodist Church food bank.
The woman, Doyce Pitre, told deputies she was so frightened when she saw an armed man step out of a closet at the food bank that she left her keys in the door as she fled.
The man took the keys and drove away in her car at about 9:15 a.m., officials said.
Eizember drove about 200 miles east, where he allegedly kidnapped a doctor, Samuel Peebles, and his wife, Suzanne, near Waldron, Ark., O’Keefe said. They were forced to drive in their van about 300 miles south to East Texas, he said.
At that point, Samuel Peebles managed to grab a pistol he had concealed in his van and shot Eizember, O’Keefe said. The couple then drove Eizember to the hospital, O’Keefe said.
Wounded four times in the chest, Eizember was in stable condition early Monday at the Memorial Health System of East Texas in Lufkin.