Dispatch calls outline path of inmate who escaped in east Louisville

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- A busted car window, shut down stores, locked down schools and a kidnapped couple, all left behind by one man.

Louisville Metro Police are still on the lookout for 31-year-old Norman K. Wolfe, who they said jumped out of the back of a law enforcement vehicle in east Louisville on Thursday morning.

Norman Wolfe.jpeg — Norman Wolfe *(Photo courtesy of the Louisville Metro Police Department)*

Wolfe, a convicted felon, was being transported north to Trimble County in an unmarked SUV for a court date Thursday morning when he kicked out the back window, jumped out and ran across Interstate 265 shortly before 9 a.m., according to Louisville Metro Police Department spokesman Aaron Ellis.

Calls flooded into dispatch.

"I've gotten three calls from passing motorists saying a guy basically jumped out of a window of a car in an orange jumpsuit," one dispatcher can be heard saying in a recording of dispatch calls from Thursday morning. "Last I heard he still had cuffs."

As police searched east Louisville for Wolfe, stores closed and schools took security measures. An LMPD officer can be heard in the dispatch calls saying they had found Wolfe's orange jumpsuit behind a motel.

"He's no longer in the jumpsuit," the officer said. Another call suggests Kentucky Country Day school be put on lockdown.

As officers searched from the skies and the ground, LMPD said Wolfe kidnapped a couple from Brownsboro Road, about a mile from the Paddock Shops, and forced them to drive him 10 miles away.

"He is possibly still handcuffed. He had his hands under his shirt stating that he had a gun. That's how he got a ride from these people," one officer said.

Wolfe got out at River Road near Edith, and the couple drove away unharmed. One of them told police a potential motive for Wolfe's path that day.

"He mentioned something to him, this guy that was driving, that he had stolen drugs somewhere and he had to get them to wherever they were going before someone killed his girlfriend."

Leaving behind a trail of destruction, Wolfe is still missing roughly 36 hours after he escaped.

If you see him, call 911.

Related Stories: