OLIVESBURG [OHIO]— The owner of the Olivesburg General Store said employees had posted an escaped Mansfield Correctional Institution inmate’s photograph on the counter next to the cash register Thursday.

That idea came in handy.

Hours later, a customer tackled the inmate to the floor as he was paying for items, including a candy bar, with change. The incident was captured on video.

“He didn’t even realize until he was on the ground what was going on. He kept saying, ‘I’m not going to run. You’ve got me,’” owner Connie Crossen said. “They didn’t want to take chances, so they tied him up. When they were taking him out he told one of our employees, ‘I just want this over. I just want to go back to prison.’”

“When he first walked up they all knew,” she said. “Even the customers who came in, everybody was doing second looks at him.”

Crossen said she was proud of the employees and customers.

“They all stayed calm. They did what they had to do. I can’t even explain or let anybody know just how proud of them I am. They were just awesome,” Crossen said.

Customers and employees of the store combined to apprehend escaped rapist James Myers at 5:35 p.m., according to the surveillance videotape.

Employee Greg Gallaway said he was scooping ice cream when, in disbelief, he and a customer wearing an American flag shirt for the Fourth of July recognized Myers at about the same time.

“I’m kind of looking around the room, like, ‘Is anyone else seeing what I’m seeing right now?’” said Gallaway, 20.

The customer in the flag shirt, Mark Cooper, told Cleveland’s WEWS-TV he had figured Myers was long gone, but he became suspicious when he overheard a man ask to use the store phone. Cooper — 6-foot-4 and 320 pounds — said he called authorities and then decided to take action, hoping to keep others safe, but couldn’t tell whether Myers had a weapon beneath his clothes.

“I just walked back over there and threw him to the ground, didn’t give him a chance to get a gun,” Cooper told the station. Surveillance video from the store shows Cooper grabbing Myers from behind and pinning him to the floor.

“It was awesome, honestly,” Gallaway said.

Crossen said a regular customer took rope off the store shelf and assisted the man who tackled Myers. The regular customer tied the escapee up, she said.

Myers had been at large since escaping from MANCI around 9 p.m. Wednesday, his 47th birthday.

“He came in to buy a tea and wanted to use the phone,” Crossen said. “He said he had a pickup that had broken down at Crestview High School and he wanted to call a tow truck.

“Some of the other employees recognized him, as did our customers. A customer called the sheriff, and employees called us.

“They had him tackled to the ground and tied up. This guy that took him down was a big guy.”

The Ohio Highway Patrol took Myers into custody at 6:42 p.m.

Prison officials, citing the ongoing investigation, declined to release details of the escape at a news conference at MANCI.

Myers was convicted of kidnapping, rape, aggravated burglary, corruption with drugs, having weapons under disability and menacing by stalking. He has been designated as a sexually violent predator, according to prison records.

Myers’ offenses took place in Summit County. His victim, who lives in Tallmadge, was notified of his escape.

On July 2, 2010, Myers followed the woman, then 45, home from a bar without her knowledge. He broke into her home, but when the woman pointed a gun at him, he overpowered her, took the gun and raped her at gunpoint.

Myers and the victim did not know one another, officials said.

The highway patrol’s Columbus public information office said the incident report would not be available until Monday.