Day 1

Nichole Day
Professor Julia Ellis
Criminal Justice 1010
December 12, 2016
The Study of Alcatraz: The Inescapable Prison
Off the shores of the San Francisco Bay sits an island surrounded by shark infested
waters and a cold, rough, and dangerous surf. This island is known as Alcatraz. Inmates and
guards nicknamed it The Rock.
First named from the explorer Juan Manuel de Ayala in 1775 for noticing all of the
numerous pelicans that roosted on the island. He gave it the Spanish word for pelican which is
Alcatrices later Americanized to Alcatraz. The prison there was once thought to be
inescapable in its running time.
The prison sits on the rocky outcrop of the island. The place is surrounded by choppy
rough waters and sheer cliffs. Even if an escape was partially successful, there is still the strong
current that leads away from the bay, the threat of hypothermia from the frigid water, as well the
presence of sharks. The only way to access the island was at certain times by ferry.
It was once an old army prison established in 1850 by President Millard Fillmore that
was used in the Civil War to hold captives, and was also used as a lighthouse. It was rebuilt in
1934 after the army left it and closed its doors in 1963 and is now a national park.
Like most prisons, Alcatraz had programs to make them self-sufficient such as having its
own hospital and dentistry. By utilizing work programs such as clothes factories and shoe shops,

Day 2
it gave the prisoners rehabilitative services and helped the prison function with little help from
the outside world.
Alcatraz in theory was also a way to reassure the public that the most dangerous felons
and gangsters could not get out. The federal government sent its worst offenders to the island and
has housed famous people like the murderer Robert The Bird Man Stroud and infamous
gangsters like Al Capone.
Like modern day prisons, prisoners of Alcatraz had to earn their privileges and
dissatisfactory behavior was not tolerated. An example of this was the Chicago gangster, Al
Capone. On the mainland in the previous prisons he was in, he was given luxury and special
privileges such as special bedding and furniture in his cell, like carpets and cushioned chairs. He
also reportedly had guards working for him. He was shocked coming into Alcatraz to see that he
would not have the advantages he had and would be treated like an ordinary inmate while he
spent his sentence there.
Alcatraz was considered a maximum security prison and was technologically advanced
for its time. One of the examples of new technology for the time period to be used in the facility
was the use of electromagnetic metal detectors put by the prison industrial and dining hall
entrances.
The facility also had tool-proof iron bars. Pipes and electricity were all hidden behind
cemented walls, and all cells were not set on the perimeter meaning even if you could get out of
your cell you had to figure out how to get outside.
No one thought anyone could escape off the island and live. During the years Alcatraz
was open, 36 men tried to escaped in 14 separate attempts. Everyone except 3 men were

Day 3
recaptured or died in the process. These three men were named John Anglin, Clarence Anglin,
and Frank Morris.
Their elaborate escape attempt is one that will remain in infamy due to the elaborate
plans and the fact that they were never found and still as of this date remains a mystery as to if
they survived their escape off of the island. Their plans show some of the flaws in the system of
the prison and how even well laid out architecture and building plans can have its weaknesses.
Their plan took months to lay out. They used crude tools fashioned out of various tool
parts and began to slowly chip away at the back of their cell vents at night so as to not be seen.
The cement was so easy to chip away because the salt water acted as a corrosive agent and
weakened the toughness of the cement, making it easier to chip away at. After making the hole
they had discovered a back utility room that was not guarded and led to the roof.
They then took toilet paper and stolen flesh colored paint, and they made life like
dummies of themselves with reported real human hair from the barbershop to lay on their beds at
night to look like they were sleeping. They had apparently also stolen wood scraps and raincoat
materials and were thought to have made a raft to swim off the island with, as well as fashioned
homemade life vests.
On June 11th, 1962 guards noticed they were missing and began the search. They were
thought to have scaled up the walls of the utility room to through an air duct. They then went
undetected climbing down the building, over a fence, down the cliffs, and set the raft and
themselves out to sea. All they were able to find later were scraps from the rain coats, a life vest,
and crude wooden paddles. They have never been found and the case still remains open with the
US Marshalls.

Day 4
Another attempted escape is known as the Battle of Alcatraz. In 1946 a man by the name
of Bernie Coy, who was serving a 25-year sentence for bank robbery was plotting to escape. His
plot was to access guns from the guards and keep them hostage so as to obtain the keys that
opened the security doors and manage an escape by commandeering a ferry boat.
Cell block D was the only block to contain an armed guard looking over with a catwalk
because it was the only block to contain the isolation block, in modern day known as
administrative segregation. This was for the more dangerous offenders and the more aggressive
offenders. The other blocks contained the normal and general prison population.
Modern prisons do not carry firearms and many do not even carry pepper spray because
of the risk of it falling into an inmates hands and being used against them. They are used if it is
absolutely necessary, such as in the guard towers, and when there are skirmishes and riots.
When the escape was initiated, Coy and six accomplices made their move. While the six
others made a distraction, Coy scaled the wall up the catwalk. He went between the bars and
overpowered the guard.
Using the stolen keys from the guard he made it to an armory room and stole ammunition
such as tear gas, nightsticks, rifles, gas masks, and pistols. Using the ammunition, they
overpowered the guards of cell block D below and set the prisoners contained therein free while
locking up the guards in an empty cell.
The problem in their plans was the fact that many of the inmates of D block did not want
to get involved in the chaos and so their plan started to go sour. They could also not locate the
keys to access the main doors that led to the other blocks.

Day 5
Soon the alarm was sounded and the inmates and responding reinforcement guards began
a fire fight. Many of the guards were injured. At one point realizing they were not escaping the
island alive, a prisoner shot into the cell with the guards that were being held as hostages and
critically wounded some of them.
Eventually a standoff ensued and Robert The Bird Man Stroud was elected as a
negotiator between the outside reinforcements and the inmates who were willing to surrender
after being cut off from water, food, and proper sewage disposal.
Coy and two other inmates used the stolen ammunition though instead to arm and defend
themselves as they barricaded themselves between cell blocks. The outside reinforcements
drilled holes in the roof and threw concussion grenades inside the blocks. Although the three men
tried to avoid the grenades thrown at them they were struck and killed by the shrapnel in the
process. The battle eventually ended and the blocks were all recaptured and put back into order.
Shortly thereafter, Alcatraz decided with the building structure in question and the
possibility of more escapes from finding the flaws in the building, they would have to close the
prison for good. In 1963 they shipped the remaining prisoners to live out their sentences at other
prisons on the mainland.
These stories showed that Alcatraz was like any other modern day prison. They had the
latest technology and cell formation for the time period. They were also isolated from the main
land and thought that the prison was an inescapable place.
This place also shows though how inmates with long amounts of time can plan escapes
and find flaws within the system in order to exploit them and use them to their advantage. As

Day 6
new technologies and strategies emerge we need to think of how to properly reintegrate
convicted felons back into society and not just housing them in fortresses.

Works Cited
Alcatraz Prison. Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology (1931-1951), vol. 25, no. 3, 1934,
pp. 475476. www.jstor.org/stable/1136240.
Ocean View Publishing. "Welcome to Alcatraz History." www.AlcatrazHistory.com. N.p., n.d.
Web. 13 Dec. 2016.
History.com Staff. "Alcatraz." History.com. A&E Television Networks, 2009. Web. 13 Dec.
2016.
Zaremba, John. "Facts About Alcatraz Prison." USA Today. Gannett Satellite Information
Network, n.d. Web. 13 Dec. 2016.
"Alcatraz Escape." FBI. FBI, 08 Aug. 2016. Web. 13 Dec. 2016.
Gilbert, Benjamin Franklin. San Francisco Harbor Defense during the Civil War. California
Historical Society Quarterly, vol. 33, no. 3, 1954, pp. 229240.
www.jstor.org/stable/25156501.
Converse, George S. "A Most Timely Skirmish." Naval History 29.6 (2015): 48-53. Academic
Search Premier. Web. 14 Dec. 2016.