Fleeing to Denver, Miner soon turned up in Georgia, where he and two accomplices held up a Southern Railway train on February 18, 1911. Their loot was just over $2,000 in American, Mexican, and Canadian coins and currency. The bandit trio was promptly captured and the sixty-four-year-old Miner sentenced twenty years in prison. After two escapes, Miner died at the Milledgeville, Georgia state prison on September 2, 1913. Dubbed “The Grey Fox” in his twilight years, Miner had become a folk hero by this time, but despite his compelling personality and colorful history, the old man was a chronic liar and career criminal as has been shown. But oh, how delighted he would have been to know that a feature film of his colorful life was made in 1983.
J
ake Oppenheimer remained in the “incorrigible” cells, simmering in his own particular hell. After spending thirteen months sawing through the bars of his cell with a large needle, he escaped on August 15, 1907. Rushing to the mess hall, he assaulted a convict named Wilson with a bread knife, badly wounding him. Already serving a life sentence for previously murdering a Folsom convict, Oppenheimer was this time tried and sentenced to death. After being transferred back to Folsom, he stabbed convict Francisco Quijada to death, then spent the rest of his life trying to evade his death penalty. He attracted a few supporters, including Ed Morrell and Jack London, to his cause, but ultimately he was hanged on July 11, 1913.
E
d Morrell spent several years in solitary at San Quentin, and seems to have reformed when a new warden released him in late 1904. He was made a trusty and began a letter-writing campaign in an attempt to obtain a commutation of his sentence. His efforts were rewarded in 1908 and he was released on March 14. He now joined Jack London and others in trying to save Oppenheimer from hanging. London used Morrell’s prison experiences in his book, The Star