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Frein transferred to death row in maximum security prison

(AP) Eric Matthew Frein - now inmate MY0275 - will spend the majority of his days in an 85-square-foot cell in a maximum security prison in the southwest corner of the state.

The Monroe County man convicted of killing a state trooper and critically wounding another during a sniper attack at the Blooming Grove barracks arrived at death row at the State Correctional Institution at Greene on Wednesday after his intake into the state prison system, Department of Corrections spokeswoman Amy Worden said Friday.

A Chester County jury sentenced Frein, 34, of Canadensis, to death late last month after 16 days of testimony in Pike County Court. That jury previously convicted Frein of two counts of first-degree murder and 10 other charges for killing Cpl. Bryon K. Dickson II of Dunmore and severely wounding Trooper Alex T. Douglass of Olyphant during the Sept. 12, 2014, ambush at the Pike County barracks.

Frein hid in the treeline across from the barracks a nd fired four shots from a rifle before disappearing into the woods. U.S. marshals captured him 48 days later at an abandoned airport hangar he used as a hideout in Pocono Twp.

With Frein's transfer to the Greene County prison, his lodging is established for the rest of his life, unless his sentence is vacated or his conviction is overturned on appeal.

A death row inmate's day begins with the first count shortly after 6 a.m., said Patrick Felice, the capital case manager at SCI-Greene. The inmates get breakfast and spend two hours in segregated recreation. They are allowed to visit the law library once or twice a week and take a shower at some point in the day. They are allowed televisions, cable, visits and three phone calls per week. Dinner is at 4 p.m. and the final count takes place five hours later.

Pennsylvania had a death row population of 171 inmates as of April 3. In February 2015, Gov. Tom Wolf placed a moratorium on executions until he reviews a f orthcoming report from a task force commissioned to study capital punishment. Pennsylvania has not executed a death row inmate since 1999, when "House of Horrors" killer Gary Heidnik died by lethal injection for the murders of two of six women he kidnapped, tortured and raped in his North Philadelphia basement from 1986 through 1987.