:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/sara-jo-pender-89-02182026-396a66df86ee460f9922ffe65471ce64.jpg "Where is Sarah Pender now? Inside the Girl on the Run subject's infamous prison escape (and its b...")
Pender, who eluded authorities for several months across multiple states, is the subject of a new ABC News docuseries. Where is Sarah Pender now? Inside the Girl on the Run subject's infamous prison escape (and its brutal aftermath) Pender, who eluded authorities for several months across multiple states, is the subject of a new ABC News docuseries. By Randall Colburn :maxbytes(150000):stripicc()/RandallColburnauthorphotoe7e8b48d9f8645588439077e721a5f48.jpg) Randall Colburn Randall Colburn is a writer and editor at . His work has previously appeared on The A.V.
Pender, who eluded authorities for several months across multiple states, is the subject of a new ABC News docuseries.
Where is Sarah Pender now? Inside the Girl on the Run subject's infamous prison escape (and its brutal aftermath)
Pender, who eluded authorities for several months across multiple states, is the subject of a new ABC News docuseries.
By Randall Colburn
:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/Randall-Colburn-author-photo-e7e8b48d9f8645588439077e721a5f48.jpg)
Randall Colburn
Randall Colburn is a writer and editor at **. His work has previously appeared on *The A.V. Club, The Guardian, The Ringer*, and many other publications.
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February 20, 2026 12:00 p.m. ET
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Sarah Pender, as seen on 'Girl on the Run: The Hunt for America's Most Wanted Woman'. Credit:
ABC News Studios
- Sarah Pender was sentenced to 110 years in prison for the 2000 murders of Andrew Cataldi and Tricia Nordman.
- Pender, who claims she's innocent of the murders, escaped prison in 2008 and managed to elude authorities for over four months.
- A documentary about her story, *Girl on the Run: The Hunt for America's Most Wanted Woman*, is now streaming on Hulu.
In 2008, a 29-year-old whom a prosecutor described as having a "Charles Manson-like ability to manipulate people," escaped from the Rockville Correctional Facility in Indiana. That woman, Sarah Pender, is the subject of the new ABC News docuseries *Girl on the Run: The Hunt for America's Most Wanted Woman*.
The title is no joke. Following her escape, Pender was among the 15 most-wanted fugitives by U.S. Marshals, due in part to the brutal nature of her conviction and her ability to elude authorities across four months and three states.
So, who is Sarah Pender? How did she end up in jail? And, most compellingly, how did she manage to escape? We answer those questions, and explain where she is now, below.
Who is Sarah Pender?
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Sarah Pender's mugshot.
Sarah Pender was born on May 29, 1979, in Greenfield, Ind., roughly 30 minutes from downtown Indianapolis. In the documentary, her parents describe her as "kind and considerate" and highly intelligent. After graduating high school, she attended Purdue University, where she studied biophysics, biochemistry, and calculus.
But, as Pender tells it, her studies left her uninspired and she flunked many of her classes. She credits the divorce of her parents when she was six with her fear of abandonment. Her self-worth, she says, came not from her intelligence, but from "making other people happy."
After dropping out of college and getting a job, Pender got serious with Richard Hull, a convicted felon and drug dealer. The couple moved into a house in Indianapolis with old friends of Hull's, Andrew Cataldi and Tricia Nordman. According to Hull, he and Caraldi began selling drugs together.**
What did Sarah Pender do?
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Sarah Pender, as seen on 'Girl on the Run: The Hunt for America's Most Wanted Woman'.
ABC News Studios
On Oct. 27, 2000, Hull was arrested after the dead bodies of Cataldi and Nordman were found in a dumpster near their home. Pender was arrested the following day. Cataldi and Nordman had been shot, killed, and disposed of on Oct. 24.
According to Pender, she went for a walk on the evening of Oct. 24. When she returned home, she saw blood on the floor and found Hull wrapping Nordman's body in a blanket. Fearing for her safety, she agreed to help Hull dispose of the bodies in a nearby dumpster.
Hull, meanwhile, claimed that Pender was behind the murders, alleging that he found her holding the shotgun that killed Cataldi and Nordman next to their dead bodies.
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Larry Sells, a deputy prosecutor in Marion County at the time, believed that Pender had manipulated Hull into committing the murders, characterizing her as a "female Charles Manson."
Evidence against her included:
- Pender was the one who bought the shotgun that killed Cataldi and Nordman on the morning of the murders.
- Floyd Pennington, an incarcerated penpal of Pender's, testified that she told him she was the mastermind behind the shooting.
- Hull's attorney produced a letter allegedly written to him by Pender in which she confessed to doing the murders while on LSD. (Hull later admitted in an affidavit that the letter was fake.)
While this evidence would later prove contentious, she was found guilty of the murders. In August 2002, she was sentenced to 110 years in prison.
The following year, Hull was sentenced to 75 years after pleading guilty to the murders and admitting he was the sole shooter.**
How did Sarah Pender escape prison?
Pender, the first inmate to break out of the Rockville Correctional Facility, escaped with the help of a correctional officer, Scott Spitler, and a friend and former inmate named Jamie Long.
According to official court documents, Pender agreed to pay Spitler $15,000 to assist her in escaping from prison. In the documentary, Pender alleges that he'd helped her obtain contraband she sold to her fellow inmates, and also that he initiated a sexual relationship with her. "I did what I had to do," she says.
On Aug. 4, 2008, after getting her a cellphone and a set of civilian clothes, Spitler snuck Pender into a van and drove her out the back gate and into the visitor parking lot, where she transferred to Long's vehicle and driven to a local safe house.
How long was Sarah Pender on the run?
Pender evaded authorities for roughly four months — 138 days, to be exact — with the help of several former inmates and a "sugar daddy" she met during a threesome.
- Long, with whom Pender shared a romantic relationship in prison, helped set her up in a safe house.
- Peggy Darlington, another former cellmate who believed Pender to be innocent, worked with Long to help deliver money to Pender. Darlington was not accused of any wrongdoing.
- Pender claims in the documentary that an exotic dancer offered her refuge. To help Pender make money, she invited her to participate in a threesome with a client from the club where she worked.
- This man became, in Pender's words, her "sugar daddy," continuing to date her even after finding out she was a fugitive. He helped set her up with a job and a place to stay in Cincinnati.
Throughout the several months she was on the run, Pender routinely moved locations, cut and dyed her hair, and wore colored contacts to help evade detection. Eventually, she uprooted from Ohio to Illinois, landing a job through a friend in Chicago and using the name Ashley Thompson.
In the doc, she recalls her time in Chicago as blissful. "There was not a time I did not enjoy experiencing new things," she said.**
How was Sarah Pender caught?
Roughly a month after escaping Rockville Correctional Facility, Pender was featured on an episode of *America's Most Wanted*. In October 2008, she was placed on U.S. Marshals' list of the 15 most wanted fugitives.
On Dec. 22, 2008, she was arrested at her apartment on the north side of Chicago thanks to an anonymous tipster. As she details on *Girl on the Run*, she considered fleeing through the back door after the realizing the cops had arrived, but she'd grown tired of running.
"The universe let me out of prison," she says, "and now the universe is telling me it's time to go back."**
Her escape and capture was dramatized in a 2012 Lifetime movie, *She Made Them Do It*, starring Jenna Dewan-Tatum.
Where is Sarah Pender now?
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Sarah Pender on 'Girl on the Run: The Hunt for America's Most Wanted Woman'.
ABC News Studios
After getting caught, Pender was placed in solitary confinement for more than five years. "I was told by officers, 'You embarrassed the Department of Corrections. Therefore, they're going to keep you in solitary confinement,'" she says.**
Over the past 15 years, Pender has worked with various attorneys and, in a surprising twist, Larry Sells, the Marion County deputy prosecutor who fought to put her behind bars, to reduce her sentence.
Sells changed his tune after learning that much of the evidence against Pender has been disputed. Pennington's testimony, for example, was deemed dubious after it was revealed he kept a "snitch list" of people he would inform on if it meant getting a plea deal. The letter to Hull in which Pender allegedly confessed to committing the murders was later deemed a fake, with Hull himself admitting that his cellmate wrote it.
Pender, meanwhile, claims she bought the murder weapon since Hull, due to his prior felonies, couldn't purchase a gun himself. She says she had no idea he would use it for murder.
Their efforts, however, have not panned out. In January 2026, a Marion County judge rejected Pender's request to modify her sentence so she could be released. According to *Girl on the Run*, she won't be eligible for parole until 2054, when she'll be 75 years old.**
Where can I watch Girl on the Run: The Hunt for America's Most Wanted Woman?
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'Girl on the Run: The Hunt for America's Most Wanted Woman'.
ABC News Studios
*Girl on the Run: The Hunt for America's Most Wanted Woman* is now streaming on Hulu.
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Published: February 20, 2026 at 07:57PM on Source: MARIO MAG
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