We DID escape from Alcatraz
Letter to cops claims to be from fugitive
I am 83 years old and in bad shape. I have cancer. Yes, we all made it out that night LETTER ALLEGEDLY SENT BY ESCAPED CON JOHN ANGLIN
sent to the San Francisco Police’s Richmond station, appears to be correct on Anglin’s age.
At the time of writing, if still alive, he would have been 83.
Officials confirmed the note forced the FBI to reopen the cold case.
The US Marshals, who oversee the recapture of prisoners, said the FBI lab forensically examined the new letter, but results were inconclusive.
In a statement, a spokesman said: “There is absolutely no reason to believe that any of them would have changed their lifestyle and became completely law-abiding citizens after this escape.”
John’s 80-year-old sister told the Daily Mirror she was no doubt her brothers survived their break for freedom.
Speaking at her home in Sun City, Florida, Mearl Anglin Taylor said: “I don’t know if they are alive or dead now, but I know for sure they survived.” Since their prison break, the men have gone down in folklore and were the subject of 1979 Hollywood film Escape from Alcatraz, starring Clint Eastwood.
Alcatraz was the most secure prison in the US, surrounded by the rough waters of the Pacific.
“The Rock” where Al Capone, George “Machine Gun” Kelly and other infamous criminals were held, was thought to be escape-proof.
No one is known to have made it out alive in its 29 years as a federal prison from 1934 and 1963.
Forty-one inmates tried, with 26 recaptured, seven shot dead, three drowned and two, besides Morris and the Anglin brothers, were never found.
The trio’s audacious escape took place on the night of June 11, 1962.
Guards checked on them periodically, looking in at the sleeping faces.
By morning, the inmates had gone. In their place were pillows under the bedclothes and realistic papier-mâché heads. A hole in the cell wall led to the prison’s ventilation shafts.
Thousands of police and prison staff joined the largest manhunt since the Lindbergh baby kidnapping in 1932.
A crude raft made of rubber raincoats was found on a nearby island. Federal officials said they almost certainly drowned, their bodies swept out to sea.
But US Marshal Michael Dyke, who inherited the case in 2003, previously said he did not know if any of the trio were still alive but cautioned he had seen enough evidence to make him wonder.
A 2015 History Channel special featured a photo allegedly showing the escaped brothers in Brazil in 1975.
Fred Brizzi, who grew up with John and Clarence, claimed he took the snap of the pair at a farm in Rio de Janeiro.
Brizzi died in 1993 but had given the picture to the brothers’ family the previous year, nephew Ken Widner said.
Ken explained: “He had to wait until a certain time that would not get the brothers or family in trouble.”
Relatives of the Anglins have also previously produced letters they said were sent by the brothers over the years.
But Jolene Babyak, whose father was acting warden the night of the escape, does not believe the trio made it.
When she was shown the newly released letter, the author said: “Lots of allegations, no real evidence, nothing you can follow up on.”