Wanted: the old men who escaped Alcatraz
New digital images show what the fugitives would look like now – 60 years after their prison break
A theory developed that the Anglin brothers had attended their mother’s funeral in disguise in 1973
SIXTY years after America’s most notorious prison break, the US Marshals Service has released digitally aged mugshots of what the fugitives would look like now.
On June 11 1962, Frank Morris, together with brothers, John and Clarence Anglin, launched a daring bid for freedom, which would later be immortalised in Escape From Alcatraz starring Clint Eastwood.
After breaking out of the island prison, the convicts are widely believed to have drowned making the perilous mile-long crossing of San Francisco Bay on a makeshift raft.
But conspiracy theories that they survived still persist, and police said the hunt for them is ongoing, even though the men would all now be in their 90s.
A US Marshals spokesman said: “The ongoing investigation of the 1962 escape from Alcatraz federal prison serves as a warning to fugitives that, regardless of time, we will continue to look for you and bring you to justice.”
Alcatraz was known as the “ultimate maximum security prison” and many tried and failed to escape.
Known as “the Rock” it had fortified iron bars, guard towers and officers checking inmates a dozen times a day. It hosted some of America’s most infamous criminals including Al Capone, George “Machine Gun” Kelly, and Robert Stroud, the so-called “Birdman of Alcatraz”.
In the 1979 Hollywood retelling of the escape – in which Eastwood played Morris – the question of whether the men made it across the chilly bay was left open.
Their elaborate escape plan, which took a year to prepare, involved digging through the wall of their cells with spoons. It gave them access to a utility corridor, which allowed them to get to the cell block roof.
They joined together 50 Second World War-era raincoats, with rubber linings, to create a raft measuring 14ft by 6ft. In addition, they made wooden paddles and used a musical instrument as an air pump for the raft.
Flesh-coloured dummy heads were constructed using plaster, paint and real hair from the prison barbershop.
On the night of the escape they positioned the heads to make it look like they were asleep in their beds, fooling the guards.
That gave them a 10-hour window before they were found to be missing.
After climbing on to the roof they shimmied down a pipe from the bakery, scaled a fence and reached the shore, where they set off on the raft.
Once they were reported missing the prison went into full lockdown and a massive air, sea and land search was launched.
A sealed bag, containing addresses and numbers, was found in the water.
It was concluded that they drowned, but their bodies were never found. Potential evidence later emerged that the raft may have made it to nearby Angel Island.
There were also reports that a car was stolen by three people on the night of the escape.
A theory also developed that the Anglin brothers attended their mother’s funeral in disguise in 1973.
She had reportedly previously received flowers, with no card, while she was alive.
In 2013 a letter was sent to police by a man claiming to be John Anglin.
In it he said he was alive but suffering from cancer, and he offered to serve a year in prison in return for medical treatment.
He also said his brother died in 2008, and Morris passed away in 2005.
A photograph of the Anglin brothers emerged in 2015 which was purported to have been taken in Brazil in the 1970s. The following year police investigated a deathbed confession in which a man claimed to have been an accomplice.
He said he had picked up the escapees by boat in the bay, and later murdered them.
Alcatraz was closed down in 1963 as it was deemed too expensive to run.