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New York prison escape: Police go house-to-house and retrace steps

Police said they would search houses in the village of Dannemora, but they specified that the plan was "not the result of a new lead."
Law enforcement officers walk the streets near the prison in Dannemora, N.Y., as they searched houses near the maximum-security prison in northern New York where two killers escaped using power tools, June 10, 2015.
Law enforcement officers walk the streets near the prison in Dannemora, N.Y., as they searched houses near the maximum-security prison in northern New York where two killers escaped using power tools, June 10, 2015.

Still empty-handed in their search for two escaped murderers, police in New York said they would go house-to-house on Wednesday in the prison town and retrace their steps.

Police said they would search houses in the village of Dannemora, but they specified that the plan was "not the result of a new lead." Law enforcement also set up a checkpoint several miles from the prison, checking cars, opening trunks and talking to drivers.

There was still no sign early Wednesday of Richard Matt and David Sweat, five days after they busted out of a maximum-security prison by cutting the steel in their cell walls, shimmying through a 2-foot duct and popping out of a nearby manhole to freedom.

Investigators said they were questioning Joyce Mitchell, a supervisor in the prison's tailor shop, where the two inmates worked. On the day the killers were reported missing, she checked into the hospital, complaining of a panic attack.

In an exclusive interview with NBC News, her son, Tobey, said his mother was "not the kind of person that's going to risk her life or other people's lives to let these guys escape from prison."

Asked whether his mother might have been taken advantage of, he said: "I don't know. I mean, they both are convicted murderers. I mean, you have an inmate that is in prison for life, you really don't have anything to lose."

On Tuesday, a tip led police to swarm the town of Willsboro, about 50 miles southeast of the prison.

This article originally appeared on NBC News.com