Prison seamstress Joyce Mitchell says she was giving into fear, not following her heart, when she helped two dangerous murderers bust out of a maximum-security lockup this summer, putting a swath of upstate New York on high alert for nearly three weeks.
In an exclusive jailhouse interview with "Today's" Matt Lauer, Mitchell admitted she flirted with Richard Matt and David Sweat but said that any sexual contact with Matt was against her will.
Mitchell, 51, has pleaded guilty to providing tools for Matt and Sweat's audacious June 6 escape from the Clinton Correctional Facility. She faces up to seven years in prison when she is sentenced on Sept. 28.
"I deserve to be punished," she told Lauer. "But, you know, people need to know that I was only trying to save my family."
