Escape from Alcatraz (1962)

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The presumably successful escape from Alcatraz is the disappearance of the three inmates Frank Morris, John Anglin and Clarence Anglin from the US prison island Alcatraz off San Francisco in the state of California on June 11, 1962. A fourth man (Allen West) had to be left behind due to lack of time become. It is believed that Morris and the Anglin brothers drowned while trying to escape. The story was later used as a template for the movie Escape from Alcatraz starring Clint Eastwood .

The escape was one of a total of fourteen escape attempts from Alcatraz and, along with the escape of Theodore Cole and Ralph Roe in 1937, is considered the only one that was possibly successful.

Alcatraz Prison Island (2005)

The refugees

Frank Morris

Frank Lee Morris (born September 1, 1926 ) is said to have an IQ of 133. In the course of his life he was convicted of drug trafficking and armed robbery, among other things, and was taken to the prison island of Alcatraz in 1960 (inmate number AZ1441).

John and Clarence Anglin

John William Anglin (born May 2, 1930 in Donalsonville , Georgia ) and Clarence Anglin (born May 11, 1931 in Donalsonville, Georgia) were a pair of brothers. John Anglin was jailed for theft and bank robbery after escaping federal prison in Leavenworth with his brother .

Allen West

Allen Clayton West (born March 25, 1929 in New York City , † December 21, 1978 ), was imprisoned for car theft in 1955, initially in the Atlanta Penitentiary . After an unsuccessful attempt to escape from Florida State Prison , he was transferred to Alcatraz in 1957 (inmate number AZ1335). West was delayed trying to escape from Alcatraz and stayed behind. He died in prison.

  • Participants in the escape

  • Frank Morris (AZ1441)

  • John Anglin (AZ1476)

  • Clarence Anglin

  • Allen West

procedure

One of the escape cells

The three men were able to dig their way through the ventilation shafts of the cells within two years, as the mortar, which had been severely attacked by salt and moisture, became brittle and was therefore relatively easy to scratch away with solid steel cutlery smuggled into the cells. On June 11, 1962, they finally got outside via the roof of the cell block and then disappeared in an inflatable boat that they had made themselves with the help of raincoats and glue.

Dummies used for the escape

So that the escape would not be noticed immediately, they had made heads out of cotton, soap and human hair. Their disappearance wasn't noticed until the next morning, when they were already over nine hours ahead. Parts of her dinghy and her swimming aids were washed ashore or salvaged by fishermen.

The whereabouts of the refugees

The FBI investigation into the case, completed in 1979, suspects the escapee to have died by drowning. Corpses themselves were never found, which is not unusual for the bay with its strong current out to the open Pacific. Nevertheless, rumors of a successful escape persist. Some recent evidence suggests that Morris and the Anglin brothers managed to escape. Later experiments have also shown that it was possible to swim ashore from Alcatraz.

In 2013, the San Francisco Police Department received a letter allegedly written by John Anglin. It is written about the successful escape of all three escapes. Clarence Anglin died in 2008 and Frank Morris died in 2005, John Anglin himself suffered from cancer. An analysis of the handwriting by the FBI could not clearly clarify whether the letter is authentic.

A program broadcast by the pay TV channel History in 2015 deals with the escape. Accordingly, at least John and Clarence Anglin should have survived the escape. The family of the Anglin brothers provided the basis for this. The inmates' nephews, Ken and David Widner, provided the TV broadcaster with documents from the family that are believed to date from after 1962. This also included a photograph that a childhood friend of the Anglin brothers claims to have taken of them in Brazil in the mid-1970s when he allegedly met the brothers by chance. The two are said to have invited him to their farm where the photo is said to have been taken. The documentary shows, among other things, how an American expert in forensic face recognition analyzes the photo from 1975 in detail and comes to the conclusion with great certainty that the men in the photo are the Anglin brothers.

Frank Morris and the brothers John and Clarence Anglin are still on the list of the most wanted criminals in Northern California (Northern California Most Wanted) . The pictures they showed there were artificially aged by the FBI and show what they might look like today.

  • Depiction of the aged refugees as they could look like according to the FBI

  • Frank Morris

  • John Anglin

  • Clarence Anglin

filming

In the 1979 film Escape from Alcatraz , Clint Eastwood (Frank Morris), Fred Ward (John Anglin) and Jack Thibeau (Clarence Anglin) played the three successful escapees. The fourth man who remains is called Charles Marsh in the movie and is portrayed by Larry Hankin .

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Alcatraz Escape Attempts. www.alcatrazhistory.com, 2018, accessed on October 4, 2018 (English).
  2. ↑ a b J. Babyak: Breaking the Rock: The Great Escape from Alcatraz , 2001, ISBN 0-9618752-3-2 (English)
  3. ↑ Escape utensils of the fugitives around Frank Morris. (No longer available online.) FBI , June 12, 2012, archived from the original on December 28, 2014 ; accessed on December 27, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.fbi.gov
  4. ^ Robert D. McFadden: Tale of 3 Inmates Who Vanished From Alcatraz Maintains Intrigue 50 Years Later , New York Times , June 9, 2012 (English).
  5. ↑ Alcatraz: Researchers reconstruct spectacular escape attempt. Spiegel Online , December 18, 2014, accessed December 17, 2016 .
  6. ^ Alcatraz escape: Fugitive John Anglin's name on letter to police. January 25, 2018, accessed March 21, 2018 .
  7. ↑ Amy B. Wang: A man claims three Alcatraz prisoners 'barely' survived a 1962 escape - and that he's one of them. In: The Washington Post , January 24, 2018, accessed May 30, 2019 (English, paid access).
  8. ↑ Myth of Alcatraz: New HISTORY documentation provides evidence of the survival of prisoners believed to be dead. NBCUniversal , April 4, 2016, accessed December 17, 2016 .
  9. ↑ Northern California Most Wanted. northerncaliforniamostwanted.org, 2016, accessed December 17, 2016 .