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28-Year Fugitive Crept Under Nose Of The Law

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By CHRIS ECHEGARAY, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 1, 2007

Video: Jailhouse Interview With Michael Hess

TAMPA - He lived unnoticed as he toiled in restaurant kitchens for a quarter century.

Living anonymously as a cook making breakfast, barbecue and chicken wings, Michael Hess wondered if his past would ever catch up to his colorless existence.

Michael Hess

It did.

As he was getting together some catering at The Press Box restaurant, the police quietly got him last week - the man who walked away from a prison detail in 1979, assumed a dead man's identify and lived a subdued life with few friends until his fingerprints tripped him up.

Hess, now 57, had served eight years of a 35-year sentence for armed robberies of convenience stores when he walked away from a prison carwash detail in Lake Butler. He eventually took on the identity of Charles Swiger, an alias he used for decades.

'You need a Social Security to hold a job,' Hess said. 'I did want to work. Now, I have to remember to use my real name. '

Now looking gaunt and wearing an orange jumpsuit, Hess gave an interview to the Tribune and News Channel 8 on Wednesday at the Orient Road Jail, recounting his 28 years escaping capture. When he signed a jail release form to be interviewed, he nearly gave the wrong name.

He said the prospect of being caught haunted him.

'There was not one day that I didn't think about it,' Hess said. 'Because of that, I would keep myself in line. I reminded myself there was always a chance.'

He faces charges of being an escapee and possession of marijuana.

After he walked away from prison, Hess said he went to downtown Tampa and took a bus to California.

Two weeks later, Hess was headed back to the only city he really knows.

He told his grandmother to forget about him. He never contacted his family.

Hess is the oldest of three siblings - his brother and sister grew up in California, and his father served time in jail, he said.

Hess knew a widowed woman who helped him assume a new identity. Hess said she told him to assume the identity of her dead husband, Charles Swiger, who died at age 52 in 1972.

'She was a spry, old individual,' Hess said. 'She knew I couldn't be Michael Hess anymore.'

Hess said he worked for Radisson Bay Harbor on the Courtney Campbell Causeway, then owned by George Steinbrenner, for 16 years serving breakfast.

In late 1999, a housekeeper shot and killed four hotel employees and a fifth person while trying to flee on the causeway. The killings drew immense media and police attention, and Hess decided to try to avoid it.

He said he went to work at Jimbo's Pit Bar-B-Q on Kennedy Boulevard before he settled in at The Press Box, a South Dale Mabry Highway sports bar known for its wings.

'I worked at the Press Box for five years and I was never late,' he said. 'I made a few friends, not a whole lot. And I didn't tell anybody.'

In between, Hess met a woman and began a nearly 20-year relationship. Hess confessed his real identity, but she didn't believe him. He said he left the relationship after the woman became addicted to crack cocaine.

Hess said he paid federal taxes under his assumed name. He said he paid rent for his small Cleveland Street apartment under that name, too.

The cook had tried to forget about Hess, erasing memories of the boy who grew up in Robles Park and the man who served in Vietnam for 11 months as an Army cook. He tried to block memories of criminal who confessed to several armed robberies.

'I admit what I did was wrong,' Hess said in a small conference room at the jail. 'With all sincerity, I am not a violent individual.'

It was a 1995 arrest for not having a valid driver's license and possession of marijuana that led to his eventual capture. When he was booked under the name Swiger, his fingerprints were in the state system. It took a while before Florida Department of Law Enforcement made a match. By the time the FDLE figured it out, Hess said, he was out of jail.

A week ago, a couple of detectives were at The Press Box. Hess was busy putting together catering for a party. He said he tried not to think anything of the visit.

But when he was walking in the back hallway, he was stopped.

Detectives called him by Charles Swiger and handcuffed him.

''You know Michael Hess?'' Hess said he was asked by a detective. 'Then, boom.'

Hess is hoping for leniency and a positive outcome.

'The best-case scenario is that they take into consideration overcrowding,' Hess said. 'That I did pretty good in the 29 years. That's the best-case scenario. But I really don't know.'

Was it worth it?

'I don't know,' Hess said. 'Ask me after I see a judge.'

Reporter Chris Echegaray can be reached at (813) 259-7920 or cechegaray@tampatrib.com.

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