Opinion ID: 1925492
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Point 2(c)

Text: In resolving this point it will be helpful to restate the legal concept of the crime of escape. In so doing, we conceive Section 710 as not creating a new and distinct offense but, rather, as providing a specific penalty for a common law escape from the Maine State Prison. Broadly stated, an escape is the departure of a prisoner from custody before he is discharged by due process of law. Hefler v. Hunt, 120 Me. 10, 13, 112 A. 675, 677 (1921). Inherent in this concept are three elements, (1) escape, (2) from lawful detention pursuant to lawful authority, (3) for a criminal offense. As was well said in Smith v. State, 145 Me. 313, 322, 75 A. 2d 538, 543 (1950): The lawfulness of the detention is the very gist of the crime of criminal escape, and the commitment by lawful authority is the very essence of the lawfulness of the detention. The escape or departure from lawful custody need not be from physical confinement within the walls of an institution but, as we said in Boyce v. State, 250 A.2d 200, 202 (Me.1969), may be from outside the walls, and the result is the same whether such departure be from an authorized or unauthorized assignment. Id; see also Chapman v. State, 250 A.2d 696 (Me.1969). The record clearly supports the decision reached by the Justice below. The State proved each of the essential elements of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. The voluntary departure from the custody of the prison guard in Oakland while the appellant was undergoing lawful detention pursuant to a valid sentence is, in the eyes of the law, an escape from the Maine State Prison.