The Prison Service is investigating how Massey managed to elude staff.
A Prison Service spokesman said:
This continues to be the subject of a thorough ongoing investigation and Mr Massey will be returned to prison custody as soon as possible.
We always press for the heaviest penalties for those who escape or attempt to escape.
A Scotland Yard spokesman said: "John Massey has this afternoon, Friday June 29, been arrested by detectives from the Metropolitan Police Service specialist crime and operations command.
"He has been taken into custody at a north London police station."
He was found following an intelligence-led operation, the spokesman said.
A second man was arrested on suspicion of aiding and abetting an absconder and was also taken into police custody.
The Prison Service is investigating how Massey managed to elude staff.
Escaped prisoner John Massey has this afternoon been arrested by MPS detectives in Faversham, Kent.
From @metpoliceuk on Twitter:John Massey is understood to have hid in the prison's gym yesterday until he could sneak on to the roof and escape over the wall without being stopped.
It is thought his makeshift rope was made from bedsheets.
Pentonville was described by prison inspectors as one of Britain's most challenging jails to run last year, but the inspection also found "no obvious problems with physical security".
A "potentially dangerous" murderer has gone on the run for the third time after escaping over the walls of Pentonville Prison using a makeshift rope.
John Massey, one of Britain's longest-serving prisoners, made off from the category B jail in Islington, north London, at around 6.30pm yesterday.
The 64-year-old used a makeshift rope to escape over a wall and was not spotted in time by prison officers, sources said.
According to The Guardian, John Massey was released on parole in 2007 and was ordered to live in a hostel in Streatham, south London.
However he left the hostel to live with his dying father.
He was sent back to prison for breaking his parole terms and was sent back to an open jail in West Sussex.
He then escaped from this open jail after hearing his sister was gravely ill. He was rearrested 10 months later and taken to Pentonville.
John Massey escaped from Pentonville prison yesterday evening. The public are urged not to approach him, but to call 999 if they see him.
Read the full storyPolice have urged the public not to approach 64-year-old John Massey, a convicted murderer who escaped from Pentonville prison earlier this evening.
Massey was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a man at a pub in Hackney, East London in 1975.
Police said:
Police are appealing for help in tracing a convicted murderer who has escaped from HMP Pentonville.
He is considered potentially dangerous and should not be approached by the public if he is seen."
Police are appealing for help in tracing a convicted murderer who has escaped from HMP Pentonville.
John Massey made off from the Islington prison at around 18.30 this evening.
He was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a man at a Hackney pub in September 1975.
He is considered potentially dangerous and police have urged the public not to approach him, but to call Islington Police on 0207 421 0296 if they have any information on his whereabouts.
Scotland Yard have said that a convicted murderer has escaped from prison tonight.
64-year-old John Massey, escaped from Pentonville Prison in Islington in North London, at around 6:30pm this evening.
Scotland Yard said he is considered "potentially dangerous" and should not be approached.
