A career criminal, Matt served recurrent prison terms in the 1980s and 1990s for various crimes including burglary, rape, theft and assault.

Matt eventually killed Rickerson by breaking his neck before dismembering his body, throwing the parts into the Niagara River and escaping to Mexico.

[4] On February 20, 1998, while in the border city of Matamoros, Tamaulipas, Matt murdered a second man, Charles Arnold Perreault, an American engineer working at a local factory.

[4] In the early morning hours of July 4, 2002, Sweat, Nabinger and a third accomplice, Shawn Devaul, burglarized a fireworks store in Great Bend, Pennsylvania, to steal firearms.

Upon returning to New York, they were spotted by Kevin Tarsia, a Broome County sheriff's deputy, while transferring the stolen firearms in a parking lot from one vehicle to another.

During the trial, Sweat and Nabinger both pled guilty to first degree murder and received life without parole to avoid capital punishment.

[16] A note was left behind on the pipe the two escapees had cut to escape, reading, "Have a nice day," with a stereotypical "Asian smiley face" wearing a triangular rice hat.

[17] Authorities searched the farms and fields around the town of Willsboro, New York, after receiving a tip that Matt and Sweat might have been spotted there on June 9.

Authorities in Canada, including the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and departments along the border with the U.S., and Mexico, where Matt had previously been convicted of murder, were also alerted.

That afternoon and evening, after bloodhounds picked up a scent and authorities discovered a footprint and a wrapper, police began methodically searching, until nightfall, a wooded area near the nearby town of Cadyville, New York.

Areas of the more populous nearby city of Plattsburgh and parts of Lake Champlain had also been searched, and billboards asking for help were put up in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Vermont,[19] Pennsylvania, and along the Canada–U.S.

[30] On June 22, the search shifted back to an area near the prison after a cabin near Owls Head in Franklin County appeared to have been broken into.

[33] Matt was spotted in Franklin County, New York on June 26 after he shot at the driver of a passing recreational vehicle with a 20-gauge shotgun taken from a hunting camp.

Cook, a firearms instructor, gave chase and when it became evident that Sweat might escape, fired two rounds from his .45-caliber Glock 37 pistol, hitting Sweat twice in his right shoulder and left arm at a range of 73 yards (67 m), near Constable, New York, roughly 16 miles (26 km) north of where Matt had been killed and just 1.5 miles (2.4 km) from the Canada–U.S.

[34] Sweat was moved on July 5 to a Special Housing Unit in the maximum security Five Points Correctional Facility in Romulus, New York.

On June 15, 2015, Governor Andrew Cuomo directed Inspector General Catherine Leahy Scott to conduct a thorough investigation to determine all factors potentially involved in the escape of inmates Richard Matt and David Sweat from Clinton Correctional Facility.

According to Clinton County District Attorney Andrew Wylie, who oversaw the prosecution of Mitchell, "[s]he had agreed to be the getaway driver, but backed out because she still loved her husband and felt guilty for participating."

On June 17, it was revealed that Mitchell, who had been suspended without pay from a $57,000-a-year position she held, had discussed having her husband, Lyle, killed in a potential murder-for-hire deal with Matt, to whom she had been close, and Sweat.

They also deduced that Matt had fallen ill due to consuming spoiled food or dirty water, based on soiled undergarments discovered at one of the cabins the duo had broken into.

[46] The Inspector General's report was released in June 2016 and found "that longstanding, systemic failures in management and oversight by DOCCS enabled two convicted murderers to meticulously orchestrate their escape from a maximum security facility almost in plain sight.

One was demoted, two were suspended pending arbitration, nine returned to work after lesser penalties were applied, and the remainder retired or resigned before being punished.

[48] On February 10, 2016, Law and Order: Special Victims Unit aired an episode called "Nationwide Manhunt" that reflected and referenced the events that transpired with the Clinton Facility Escape.

Penelope Ann Miller starred as Joyce Mitchell, with Matt played by Myk Watford and Joe Anderson as Sweat.

[52] Mitchell criticized the mini-series, which includes several prison sex scenes, for containing "lies" and denied having sexual relations with the two inmates.

[53] On December 15, 2018, Oxygen Network premiered a special entitled Dannemora Prison Break, which features Bryce Dallas Howard as the narrator.