A missing Alabama corrections official accused of helping a murder defendant escape from jail last week had a nonphysical "special relationship" with him that included allowing him privileges while incarcerated, a sheriff said.

The relationship between Vicky White, an assistant director of corrections for northwestern Alabama's Lauderdale County, and the now-fugitive Casey White was confirmed in part through tips from inmates at the county detention centre.

"We have confirmed through independent sources and other means that there was in fact a relationship between Casey White and Vicky White outside of her normal work hours – not physical contact, but a relationship of a different nature," Sheriff Rick Singleton said.

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"We were told Casey White got special privileges and was treated differently while in the facility than the other inmates," Sheriff Singleton said.

Authorities are looking for both Vicky White and Casey White, who are not related, after the corrections officer on Friday morning left the Lauderdale County detention centre with the 38-year-old inmate while he was handcuffed and shackled in her patrol car.

A warrant has been issued for Vicky White's arrest on charges of permitting or facilitating escape in the first degree.

Vicky White said she was taking Casey White to a courthouse for a mental health evaluation and would then go get medical care because she wasn't feeling well.

Authorities later discovered no hearing or evaluation was scheduled for Casey White that day, and Vicky White never arrived at the medical facility.

Her patrol car was found abandoned on Friday morning in a shopping centre's parking lot, less than a mile from the detention centre.

The situation has left Vicky White's co-workers in shock.

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The day she disappeared was to be her last day at work after nearly two decades with the department, Sheriff Singleton said.

She submitted her retirement paperwork last week, sold her home about a month ago, and had thought about moving to the beach.

"All of her co-workers are devastated. We've never had any situation like this with Vicky White. She was a model employee," Sheriff Singleton said.

Previously, Sheriff Singleton had said the corrections official had "an unblemished record" and was "an exemplary employee."

"If she did this willingly, and all indications are that she did … I guess we're trying to hold on to that last straw of hope that maybe for some reason she was threatened and did this under coercion, but absolutely you'd feel betrayed," Sheriff Singleton said.

Lauderdale County District Attorney Chris Connolly said he worked with Vicky White almost daily for 17 years and last spoke with her the day before she disappeared.

"I would have trusted her with my life," he said.

"I am so disappointed in her. She was trusted and she exploited that trust."

Vicky White had been living with her mother for the past five weeks after selling her home, but never mentioned her retirement or Casey White, the mother, Pat Davis, told CNN affiliate WAAY.

"I never heard of him, never seen his picture, nothing. I didn't know anything about him," Ms Davis told the outlet.

Ms Davis said she is in disbelief about the situation and wants her daughter to come home.

"We don't know if she was took by force or if she was voluntarily in this. But we just want her back, that's all we want."

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'I'd be surprised if they're still in Alabama'

Video shows Vicky White's patrol car stopped – about eight minutes after leaving the jail – at an intersection about two blocks from the shopping centre parking lot where it would be found abandoned, Sheriff Singleton said.

That indicates the car was driven straight to the parking lot, and the driver never attempted to go to the courthouse, he said.

But the video doesn't show what happened after the car arrived at the parking lot.

Sheriff Singleton said he believes the pair left the lot in a second vehicle – perhaps transferring to a vehicle that was staged there or being picked up by someone.

The US Marshals Service said yesterday the pair was last seen on April 29 in Rogersville, Alabama, in a gold/copper 2007 Ford Edge with unknown Alabama plates.

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"I'd be surprised if they're still in Alabama," the sheriff said.

He noted officials at the Mexican and Canadian borders have been notified of the search.

Vicky White would have money from the recent sale of her home, but her retirement fund paperwork had not yet been processed, Sheriff Singleton said.

The US Marshals Service is offering a reward of up to US$15,000 for information leading to the location of the missing inmate ($10,000) and officer ($5000).

The inmate and officer should be considered dangerous and may be armed with an AR-15 rifle and a shotgun, marshals said.

Escaped inmate is 'extremely dangerous'

Casey White is "an extremely dangerous person," Sheriff Singleton said.

He was serving 75 years in prison for a series of crimes in 2015, including a home invasion, carjacking and a police chase, according to the Marshals Service.

He was transferred from a state prison to Lauderdale County's detention centre on February 25 to attend court hearings on two capital murder charges he faces related to the 2015 stabbing death of 58-year-old Connie Ridgeway, the Marshals Service said.

He confessed to the crime in 2020 then pleaded not guilty, according to Lauderdale County District Attorney Chris Connolly.

"We're assuming he's armed because she was armed," Sheriff Singleton said of Casey White.

In 2020, while Casey White was being held in Lauderdale County's detention centre, authorities learned he planned to escape the jail and take a hostage, Sheriff Singleton said.

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"We shook him down, and we did find a shank in his possession – a shank is a prison knife. And we retrieved that. We immediately had him shipped back to the Department of Corrections," Sheriff Singleton said.

The jail already had a policy mandating two sworn deputies accompany inmates at all times, including during transportation to the courthouse – but "we emphasised that policy with him," Sheriff Singleton said.

Vicky White violated the policy by leaving the jail alone with Casey White, but since she was second-in-command at the facility other officers didn't push back, Sheriff Singleton said.

"Being the boss and over the transport, she just informed the booking officer that she was going to carry him to the courthouse and drop him off, which was a flagrant violation of policy. But I'm sure because it was her boss, the booking officer didn't question it," he noted.

As part of her job, Vicky White "was frequently throughout the cell blocks, has contact with all the inmates at one time or another," Sheriff Singleton said.

"But as far as a romantic relationship or something like that, we have no evidence or proof that that was the case, although it's a possibility," he added.

With CNN

Russian President Vladimir Putin could formally declare war on Ukraine as soon as May 9, a move that would enable the full mobilisation of Russia's reserve forces as invasion efforts continue to falter, Western officials believe.

May 9, known as "Victory Day" inside of Russia, commemorates the country's defeat of the Nazis in 1945.

Western officials have long believed Putin would leverage the symbolic significance and propaganda value of that day to announce either a military achievement in Ukraine, a major escalation of hostilities — or both.

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Officials have begun to hone in on one scenario, which is that Mr Putin formally declares war on Ukraine on May 9.

To date, Mr Putin has insisted on referring to the brutal months-long conflict as a "special military operation", effectively banning words such as invasion and war.

"I think he will try to move from his 'special operation'," British Defence Secretary Ben Wallace told LBC Radio last week.

"He's been rolling the pitch, laying the ground for being able to say 'look, this is now a war against Nazis, and what I need is more people. I need more Russian cannon fodder.'"

Throughout the conflict Putin has continuously framed his invasion of Ukraine — a country with a Jewish president — as a campaign of supposed "denazification", a description dismissed by historians and political observers alike.

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Wallace added that he "would not be surprised, and I don't have any information about this, that he is probably going to declare on this May day that 'we are now at war with the world's Nazis and we need to mass mobilise the Russian people.'"

A formal declaration of war on May 9 could potentially bolster public support for the invasion. It would also, under Russian law, allow Putin to mobilise reserve forces and draft conscripts, which officials say Russia desperately needs amid a growing manpower shortage. Western and Ukrainian officials have estimated that at least 10,000 Russian soldiers have been killed in the war since Russia invaded just over two months ago.

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Russian battlefield effort 'anaemic'

Following a series of military and logistical setbacks, Moscow has concentrated efforts on the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, which has been on the frontline of the Russia-Ukraine conflict since 2014.

But the US official on Monday described the Russian war effort there as "anaemic."

"They'll move in and then declare victory, and then withdraw their troops, only to let the Ukrainians take it back," the official told reporters at a Pentagon briefing.

The official said problems that have plagued the Russian military since their initial surge have not been fixed.

"They're still suffering from poor command-and-control, low morale in many units, less-than-ideal logistics," the official said.

Russian forces were also keen to avoid risks that could lead to further casualties to their already depleted forces, the official said, describing the ground war in the area as "very cautious, very tepid".

Meanwhile, Ukrainian forces were making significant progress in pushing the Russians back around Kharkiv, at the north-western tip of the Donbas region, the official said.

"An incredible effort there that, again, hasn't gotten a lot of headlines and hasn't gotten a lot of attention, but it's just another piece of the stiff Ukrainian resistance that they continue to demonstrate," the official said.

Putin's other May 9 options

With less than a week to go before the May 9 Victory Day, Moscow may look at places other than Donbas to make a statement.

Other options include annexing the breakaway territories of Luhansk and Donetsk in eastern Ukraine, making a major push for Odesa in the south, or declaring full control over the southern port city of Mariupol.

The US has "highly credible" intelligence reports that Russia will try to annex Luhansk and Donetsk "some time in mid-May," the US Ambassador to OSCE Michael Carpenter said on Monday.

There are also indications that Russia could be planning to declare and annex a "people's republic" in the south-eastern city of Kherson.

US State Department spokesman Ned Price said on Monday there is "good reason to believe that the Russians will do everything they can to use" May 9 for propaganda purposes.

"We've seen the Russians really double down on their propaganda efforts, probably, almost certainly, as a means to distract from their tactical and strategic failures on the battlefield in Ukraine," Mr Price said at a State Department briefing.

Price added that it "would be a great irony if Moscow used the occasion of Victory Day to declare war, which in itself would allow them to surge conscripts in a way they're not able to do now, in a way that would be tantamount to revealing to the world that their war effort is failing, that they are floundering in their military campaign and military objectives."

"I'm quite confident that we'll be hearing more from Moscow in the lead up to May 9," MrPrice added. "

I'm quite confident that you will be hearing more from the United States, from our partners, including our NATO partners, in the lead up to May 9 as well."