UNSOLVED CRIMES ALCATRAZ ESCAPE CASE

You walk down the wide-open corridors as each light powers on one at a time. Sounds of rustling bed sheets and people begin to fill the air as your dense footsteps echo throughout the hollow building. It smells like the ocean, dried out, polluted, and dead. The walls are hospital white but the mold and rust from the cell bars are slowly turning them into a dark yellow. As you do your rounds you nod to a fellow guard and you swiftly pass by him. You pass cell B19, the home of Frank Morris, prisoner #A23c who was convicted of burglary, bank robbery and several other crimes, including attempts to escape previous prisons. But you didn’t know that. You don’t know anything about the prisoners, except that they’re the most dangerous criminals alive. As you quickly glance into his cell, you notice something is off. As you do a double take, you see that Frank has barely moved at all, you can’t even detect a rising or falling of his chest. You reach your hand in between the bars and gently push his head.`

CRASH!

Frank Morris’s head rolls off the bed, as it smashes on the floor, his nose breaks off, covering the floor in chalky dust. His head is revealed to be that of a dummy.

You were the first witness to the infamous and unsolved alcatraz escape case.

In its heyday, Alcatraz was a maximum-security prison and minimum-privilege penitentiary. The prison is located on Alcatraz island in San Francisco Bay. It was built as a “tough-on-crime show of force.” The Federal Bureau of Prisons wanted to “show the law-abiding public that the federal government was serious about stopping the rampant crime of the 1920s and 1930s”

Frank Morris was placed beside two other inmates, John and Clarence Anglin. The brothers had been sent to Alcatraz after robbing a bank located in Columbia, Alabama. As we know, Frank Morris had been convicted of multiple crimes, but was finally sent to Alcatraz after a burglary. The three inmates already knew each other from previous stunts and began planning an escape almost right away. Additionally, they were aided by another inmate named Allen West.

The plan was inspired when one of the men noticed some old saw blades in an old storage closet a year prior. They then created a tunnel out of their cells by drilling tightly separated gaps around the air vent covers, causing them to loosen, and allowing the complete section of the wall to be extracted. They did this using raw tools. For example, they made a drill with the motor of a broken vacuum. Once the holes were made, they would cover them up with anything they could find, such as a suitcase or even a piece of cardboard. The escapees were also able to make their way through an unguarded utility corridor located behind the cells. This corridor lead them to the roof of their cell block inside the building. They used this as a workshop, taking turns being on the lookout for the guards. As for building for the escape, the men used stolen and donated items. They built makeshift life preservers and a raft using raincoats, and a pump to inflate the raft out of a musical instrument. While doing all of this building, the inmates were simultaneously trying to find a way to get out of the building. They ended up climbing a network of pipes on the wall to reach the 30-foot ceiling. They then were able to pry open the ventilator at the top shaft, keeping it in position temporarily with a mock bolt made out of soap.

Once the dummy heads were discovered, and the guards realized the three men escaped, the FBI was contacted immediately. In the first few days of the investigation, the FBI located letters and parts of a possible lifeboat. As days went they were slowly able to piece together the convict’s escape plan with the help of Allen West who gave some answers.

On the night of the escape, the men supposedly left their cells, collected all needed supplies and ascended to the roof. The FBI then claims they shimmied down the bakery smoke stack at the rear end of the cell house, climbed over the fence, snuck to the northeast shore of the island and launched their raft.

A supposed photo of the men alive in 1992. Ken Widner, a nephew of Clarence and John Anglin claims the photo was taken by Fred Brizzi, a family vfriend, who then gave it to the Anglin family. Widner believes that it is proof that they are alive, but can’t come home. Others say that because the men are wearing sunglasses there is no valid way of doing facial recognition and so you can’t prove it’s them. Others say it simply isn’t them, the bodies aren’t proportionate. Some people think that they would’ve died in the bay, then why haven’t their bodies washed up? Well, according to the New York Times, bodies won’t always float or reach shore when in cold deep water. Others believe they lived through the escape, but died later. However, none of these theories have any concrete proof, so until we find a body or a grave, nothing is for sure and the case technically hasn’t closed.

Works Cited

Alcatraz Escape. (2020). FBI. https://vault.fbi.gov/Alcatraz%20Escape

Alcatraz Island: Take a photo tour of “The Rock.” (2018, August 18). USA TODAY; USA TODAY https://www. usatoday.com/story/travel/destinations/2018/08/17/alcatraz-is -

FBI. (2016). Alcatraz Escape | Federal Bureau of Investigation. Federal Bureau of Investigation. https://www.fbi.gov/history/famous-cases/alcatraz-escape

FBI Presents National Park Service with 3D Printed Copies of Escape from Alcatraz Decoy Heads — FBI. (2018, November 15). Www.fbi.gov. https://www.fbi.gov/contact-us/field-offices/sanfrancisco/news/ press-releases/fbi-presents-nationalpark-service-with-3d-printed-copiesof-escape-from-alcatraz-decoy-heads

Michallon, C. (2022, July 6). Relatives and de tectives share theories on mystery of Alcatraz’s three missing men. The Independent. https://www. google.com/url?q=https://www. independent.co.uk/news/world/ americas/alcatraz-escape-island-prison-missing-inmates-b2116860. html&sa=D&source=docs&ust =1667746635101672&usg=AOvVaw0mFN1IsdMcajR2s1pWKoG7

SFGATE, A. G. (2015, October 13). Does this photo prove John and Clarence Anglin survived their 1962 Alcatraz escape? San Francisco Chronicle. https://www.sfchronicle.com/news/ article/Does-this-photo-prove-themost-famous-Alcatraz-6568415.php