Monday, December 3, 2018

The Escape Of Alcatraz By Cynthia Chege


   In the missing persons case of Frank Morris, Clarence Anglin and John Anglin, there are two theories:
 1.Did they drown?
2. Or are they somewhere on the other side of the world living their life?
Now 50 years later new leads are being presented to testify that the Anglin brothers were still alive.
The first conspiracy theory was that the men drowned. The next day their things washed ashore, so the men were then assumed dead. Even though no bodies were, found prison officials claimed it was enough evidence to file it as a drowning (Noyes 1). In order to keep the truth about the escape from the media, the prison officials presumed them dead. With Alcatraz being the kind of prison it was, there was a no escape zone. No one was ever supposed to escape and have a chance of surviving (1).

The second conspiracy was that they did make it and were somewhere on the other side of the world living their life (Noyes 1). To prove that fact John and Clarence Anglin were great swimmers. They grew up in the frigid waters of Lake Michigan (1). Their swimming skills and cold-water tolerance would eventually pay off in a big way. As scientist went back to the conditions on the night the men escaped there was a possible chance that the men could have made it (1).
Other leads that could've proved that the men did in fact make it was that a dying man had told his nurse he and an accomplice helped Frank Morris and the Anglin Brothers escape from the Alcatraz (Noyes 1). The confession indicates the two men were waiting in a boat near Alcatraz that night, they plucked the three convicts from the water and whisked them away. The man was very detailed as he told the story he even said they painted the boat white just days before they set out to assist in the escape (1).
Facts to prove the dying man wasn’t telling a fib was that, Robert Checchi an off-duty San Francisco Policeman sitting in his car just before midnight at Marina Green That evening was gazing out at the Bay when he noticed what he called a “pristine white boat” Checchi says he immediately felt like something was wrong because the boat had no lights on. He didn’t see anybody on the boat and he couldn’t hear any noise coming from the boat, but after watching the boat intently for several minutes, Checchi said a light went on. He says somebody on the boat was shining a spotlight or a flashlight into the dark waters of the Bay. He told ABC7’s I-Team it just didn't look right (Noyes 1). The following day when Checchi found out there had been an escape from Alcatraz, he went in to work and filed a report about what he had seen (1). The FBI agents asked him repeatedly “what did you see; where was it; what time was it” and even “How come you didn’t swim out to check the boat out.” Checchi recalls one FBI agent said to him, “Like hey, let's make this go away. Let's bury it (1).” Now all these years later, the deathbed confession suggests what Checchi saw could have been the boat that was there to help the convicts escape. Retired now, Checchi says he believes the men who escaped Alcatraz were on the boat. There're still elements of the deathbed confession we still look at and I wonder if some of it could be true or not. I don’t know, anything is possible and it's just one more layer to this big mystery. Esslinger the preeminent scholar on Alcatraz and the 1962 escape calls the escape from Alcatraz “one of the greatest mysteries of the 20th century” (1). He also says “I would love to know what the truth is, for every single piece of evidence that suggest these guys died, there's another piece of evidence that makes it equally as strong that they survived” (1).

Others leads that came about 50 years later that suggest the Anglin brothers were alive was the Anglin family who were finally cooperating (Donnelly 1). Evidence is offered up by the Anglin’s nephew David and Ken Widner. Alcatraz officials were not willing to say the escapes did make it. David Widner says, “that gave me the motion to prove them wrong” (1). First there were Christmas cards signed with Clarence and John Anglin's names that were delivered for their mother during the three years after the escape, they arrived without postage (1). When investigated by Roderick who retired in 2008 but still working the case says the handwriting matched. The next big piece of evidence was buried about six feet under (1). The family let investigators dig up the remains of the Anglin brother Alfred who was electrocuted during his own escape attempt from Alabama (1). They needed his DNA a set of bones washed ashore north of San Francisco in 1963. DNA proved to not be a match, Anglin family claims that the two may indeed still be alive (1). The bones could still belong to Frank Morris though he has no living relatives to test (1).


Work Cited

Whitaker, David. “New Evidence Surfaces In 56-Year-Old Alcatraz Prisoner Escape Investigation”. Brain Sharper. 12/3/2018.http://www.brain-sharper.com/entertainment/alcatraz-story-ob/

Noyes, Dan “New leads in manhunt for Alcatraz escapees”. Abc30 Action News. 12/3/2018. https://abc30.com/news/new-leads-in-alcatraz-escapees-manhunt/1351556/

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