When a body is projected with an initial speed \\\\(v_{i}\\\\) from a point at a distance \\\\(R_{E}+h\\\\) from Earth's centre, the total energy is given by\\\\(E = \\dfrac {1}{2}m{v_{i}^{2}} - \\dfrac {GmM_{E}}{(R_{E}+h)}\\\\)The body escapes Earth's gravitation when the first term in the right hand side is equal or greater than the second term, that is the escape speed. When that speed is less than the escape speed, first term is smaller than the second term implies Gravitational potential energy is higher than the kinetic energy. Hence the total energy will be negative.