Police: Suspect tried to get out of cuffs with key

Matthew Owens Matthew Owens
Matthew Owens
Matthew Owens

SALYERSVILLE, Ky. — A Magoffin County man was allegedly prepared in case police tried to take him to jail, after officers discovered him with a handcuff key.

The Magoffin County Sheriff’s Office had pulled over Matthew Owens, 50, of Salyersville, and determined him to be wanted on an indictment warrant after being charged with meth trafficking earlier this year. When police told him to turn around to be cuffed, they said he tried to run away instead, but he was stopped with a taser.

When he was arrested, Owens was double-cuffed, so the cuffs wouldn’t tighten up on him. But when they got him out of the car later, they heard the left cuff tighten up, indicating he had somehow managed to unlock it. That’s when they looked back in the car and saw the key in the seat underneath where he had been sitting.

Owens now faces charges of third-degree escape, fleeing police, resisting arrest and menacing, in addition to the original charges.