Inmate who escaped to see dying mother recaptured

The Polk County sheriff's office says it arrested 34-year-old Christopher Daniel Gay on Monday in the parking lot of a Lakeland Wal-Mart in a stolen tractor-trailer.

He had escaped in Kennesaw, Ga., on March 3, during transportation to Tennessee to face charges of stealing another trailer in January 2007 to try to get to his mother. He also is accused of stealing country singer Crystal Gayle's tour bus.

Gay is the main character in a 2007 song, "The Ballad of Christopher Daniel Gay," by Grammy-award winning bluegrass picker Tim O'Brien.

Police say he never did see his mother who soon died.