Clinton Correctional Facility Superintendent Steve Racette walks behind Gov. Andrew Cuomo at the Dannemora prison, heading for a press conference the day after Richard Matt and David Sweat escaped. Racette has been placed on administrative leave in connection with the investigation into that unprecedented breakout.

DANNEMORA, N.Y. — A dozen employees at a northern New York prison have been suspended in connection with the investigation into the escape of convicted killers David Sweat and Richard Matt earlier this month, including the superintendent.

Assistant Commissioner for Correctional Facilities James O’Gorman has been put in charge of Clinton Correctional Facility, from which two inmates escaped on June 6, according to a statement from the State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision.

Superintendent Steve Racette and two other members of the executive team have also been placed on administrative leave, the release said. Nine others are on the security staff.

The three-week long hunt for Sweat and Matt came to a violent end over the weekend. Matt was shot and killed by a Border Patrol agent about 30 miles west of the prison on Friday, and Sweat was captured Sunday after being shot twice by a state police officer about 15 miles north of where Matt was killed. Sweat remains in Albany Medical Center, where his condition was upgraded to fair on Tuesday.

The State Inspector General’s Office, at the request of Gov. Andrew Cuomo, is investigating the escape.

A dozen Inspector General staff members, including detectives and experts with law-enforcement backgrounds, are involved in the probe at the prison, along with certified fraud examiners and computer forensic specialists, a source told The Press-Republican in Plattsburgh, N.Y.

Under the microscope, with employees being interviewed by investigators, are such prison records as personnel files, data from facility computers and the daily duties of staff and cell-block operation. The names of the other suspended employees were not released.

The 12 on administrative leave join Joyce Mitchell, a civilian employee who is jailed on charges of helping the inmates escape, and correction officer Gene Palmer, who faces felony charges connected with providing contraband to Matt and also destroying paintings, considered evidence in the case, given to him by the inmate.

Palmer is not accused of assisting the escape.

Mitchell, 51, worked in the prison tailor shop and is accused of providing Matt and Sweat with chisels, a punch and a screwdriver bit that assisted the convicted killers in breaking out of the prison.

She is also suspended from her job, incarcerated at Rensselaer County Jail in Troy with bail set at $100,000 cash; her charges are first-degree promoting prison contraband, a felony, and fourth degree criminal facilitation, a misdemeanor.

Correction officer Gene Palmer, who worked in the Honor Block where Matt and Sweat were housed, was suspended on June 19 then arrested on June 24.

He is charged with two counts of tampering with evidence, a felony, for destroying or trying to destroy paintings Matt gave him; and one charge each of promoting prison contraband, also a felony.

Palmer is also accused of official misconduct.

His charges are not related directly to the prison break, but, according to his statement to police, he did deliver a package of frozen hamburger to Matt at the request of Mitchell. That package contained hidden hacksaw blades, according to the district attorney. Palmer, who passed a lie-detector test on his involvement, said he handed the meat without knowing what was inside.

Clinton County District Attorney Andrew Wylie said Sweat has spoken to investigators from the hospital, saying that Palmer knew nothing about the escape and that Mitchell was supposed to drive the getaway car.

The plan had been to kill her husband, Lyle, and hightail it to Mexico, the DA recounted. But on the day of the escape, Mrs. Mitchell didn’t show up, instead going to Alice Hyde Medical Center in Malone, N.Y., with a panic attack.

Matt and Sweat’s ingenious escape plan involved cutting holes in the steel-plate cell walls, exiting onto the catwalk that runs behind the cells, climbing down, breaking through a brick wall and then carving a hole that gave them access to a steam pipe.

They crawled through the pipe to a manhole on Bouck Street, a few blocks over from the front of the maximum-security prison, cut the lock to the cover and reached freedom.

Sweat was serving a life term without parole for the 2003 murder of a deputy sheriff. Matt was serving 25 years to life for the kidnapping, torture and dismemberment of his former boss from North Tonawanda, N.Y.

Details for this story were reported by The Press-Republican in Plattsburgh, N.Y.