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The following is a list of historically infamous prison escapes, and of people who escaped multiple times:
There have been many infamous escapes throughout history:
This section needs additional citations for verification. (June 2015) |
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Name | # | Date | Prison name | Country | Details |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Jacques Mesrine | 4 | 1969, 17 August | Prison de Percé | ![]() |
|
1972, 21 August | Saint-Vincent-de-Paul | ![]() | |||
1973, 6 June | Palais de Justice Compiègne | ![]() | |||
1978, 8 May | La Santé | ![]() | |||
François Besse | 7 | 1971, 9 May | Prison de Gradignan | ![]() |
|
1975, 20 October | Prison de Fresnes | ![]() | |||
1978, 8 May | La Santé | ![]() | |||
1979, 26 July | Palais de Justice, Brussels | ![]() | |||
Rédoine Faïd | 2 | 2013, 13 April | Maison d'arrêt de Lille-Sequedin | ![]() |
Most wanted criminal in France in 2013. Nicknamed by some as the "King of Kalashnikovs". |
2018, 1 July | Prison of Réau, France | ![]() | |||
Clark Olofsson | 6 | 1965, August | Juvenile detention center, Sweden | ![]() |
Olofsson's escapes and robberies led to the psychological description of Stockholm Syndrome |
1966 (Late) | Tidaholm Prison, Sweden | ![]() | |||
1969, 4 February | Kumla Prison, Sweden | ![]() | |||
1973, 23–28 August | Norrköping Prison, Sweden | ![]() | |||
1975, 20 March | Norrköping Prison, Sweden | ![]() | |||
1976, July | Norrköping Prison, Sweden | ![]() | |||
Vassilis Palaiokostas | 2 | 2006, 4 June | Korydallos Prison, Greece | ![]() |
Two accomplices of Palaiokostas hijacked a sight-seeing helicopter and forced the pilot to fly to the prison where Palaiokostas was being held. Two years later Palaiokostas was captured and sent back to prison.[82] |
2009, 2 February | Korydallos Prison, Greece | ![]() |
Palaiokostas once again escaped from prison by helicopter.[82] | ||
Brian Bo Larsen | 2 | 2005 | ![]() |
In 2005, he succeeded to escape by hiding in a container, with the complicity of workers from the waste collection services. | |
2014 | Vridsløselille prison | ![]() |
On 13 December 2014 he escaped for the 2nd time through the window by rope, after having sawed the bars.[83] | ||
Nachman Farkash | 5 | 1960s – 1970s | Ayalon (Ramla) Prison (1960s) | ![]() |
|
George Feigley | 2 | 1970s | SCI- Rockview, 1976
Taylor County Jail, 1978 |
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In 1976, sex cult leader and convicted rapist George Feigley escaped from SCI- Rockview in Pennsylvania. In 1978 was recaptured in West Virginia, but soon escaped from the Taylor County Jail in Grafton.[84] He was recaptured several months later[85] and imprisoned at SCI – Graterford. Plans for a helicopter escape from Graterford were unearthed in 1981.[86] In 1983 two of his followers were killed in an unsuccessful attempt to break him out of Western Penitentiary, when they drowned in a storm sewer line.[87] |
Moondyne Joe | 4 | 1861, August | Toodyay lockup | ![]() |
|
1865, November | ![]() | ||||
1866, August | ![]() | ||||
1867, 7 March | Fremantle Prison | ![]() | |||
Yoshie Shiratori | 4 | 1936 | Aomori Prison | ![]() |
Yoshie Shiratori (1907–1979), known as the "Showa Era escape artist". In 1983 a novel based on Shiratori's life, Hagoku (literally, Prison Break), was published by Akira Yoshimura and in 1985 the book was converted to a made-for-TV-movie by NHK, the Japan Broadcasting Corporation. |
1942 | Akita Prison | ![]() | |||
1944 | Abashiri Prison | ![]() | |||
1947 | Sapporo Prison | ![]() | |||
Jack Sheppard | 4 | 1724, April | St Giles's Roundhouse | ![]() |
Sheppard (1702–1724) was a robber, burglar and thief of early 18th-century London. He was arrested and imprisoned five times in 1724 but escaped four times, making him a notorious public figure. He used knotted bed-clothes to descend to ground level during his escapes. Ultimately, he was caught, convicted, and hanged at Tyburn, ending his brief criminal career after less than two years.[88] |
1724, 25 May | New Prison | ![]() | |||
1724, 31 August | Newgate Prison | ![]() | |||
1724, 15 October | Newgate Prison (the "Castle") | ![]() | |||
Steven Jay Russell (born 1957) | 4 | 1992, 13 May | Harris County jail | ![]() |
He is a U.S. con artist. As of 2010, Russell, Texas Department of Criminal Justice #00760259,[89][90] is in the Polunsky Unit, on 23-hour lockup, only having one free hour a day to shower and exercise, to stop him from escaping.[91] |
1996, 13 July | Harris County jail (2) | ![]() | |||
1996, 13 December | Maximum Security Estelle Unit in Huntsville, Texas | ![]() | |||
1998, 13 March | Maximum Security Estelle Unit (2) | ![]() | |||
Alfred George Hinds (1917–1991) | 3 | 1955 | Nottingham Prison | ![]() |
He was convicted for a jewelry robbery and sentenced to 12 years imprisonment in 1953. He escaped from Nottingham Prison after sneaking through the locked doors and over a 20-foot prison wall. |
1956 | Law Courts in London | ![]() |
After his arrest, he brought a lawsuit against authorities charging the prison commissioners with illegal arrest and used the incident to plan his next escape. He escaped but was captured at an airport five hours later. | ||
1957 | Chelmsford Prison | ![]() |
He escaped from Chelmsford Prison less than a year later. Two years later he was arrested after being stopped in an unregistered car. | ||
Collen Chauke
(1970–2003) |
3 | 1993 | Johannesburg Prison | ![]() |
He was convicted for car theft and sentenced for four years imprisonment. He escaped from prison after serving only one month of his sentence.[92] |
1997 | Pretoria Prison | ![]() |
He was found guilty of robbing R12,6-million from a depot of the SBV security company in Pretoria in October 1997. He manage to escape from Pretoria prison with five others in December 1997. | ||
1998 | Pretoria Prison | ![]() |
He escaped from prison and manage to evade the police for a year until he was recaptured in 1999 in Nelspruit.[93] | ||
Richard Lee McNair (born 1958) | 3 | 1988 | Minot municipal police station | ![]() |
He used lip balm to squeeze out of handcuffs. |
1992, October | North Dakota State Penitentiary | ![]() |
He escaped by crawling through a ventilation duct. | ||
2006, 5 April | United States Penitentiary, Pollock | ![]() |
He escaped by hiding in a pallet of used mailbags. McNair was captured in October 2007 in Canada and is now held at the ADX Florence supermax facility in Colorado.[94] | ||
Willie Sutton (1901–1980) | 3 | 1932, 11 December | Sing Sing | ![]() |
He was an American named "The Actor" and "Slick Willie". In June 1931 he was sentenced to 30 years on charges of assault and robbery. He escaped on 11 December 1932, by scaling the prison wall on two 9-foot sections of ladder that were joined. Sutton was apprehended on 5 February 1934 and was sentenced to serve 25–50 years in Eastern State Penitentiary, for a machine gun robbery of the Corn Exchange Bank. |
1945, 3 April | Eastern State Penitentiary | ![]() |
He was one of 12 convicts who escaped the institution through a tunnel. He was recaptured the same day by Philadelphia police officers, his fifth escape attempt at this prison. Sentenced to life imprisonment as a fourth time offender, he was transferred to the Philadelphia County Prison. | ||
1947, 10 February | Philadelphia County Prison | ![]() |
He and other prisoners dressed as prison guards and escaped via ladders across the prison yard to the wall.[95] | ||
Pascal Payet | 2 | 2001, 12 October | Luynes prison | ![]() |
Payet (born 1963) is a French criminal who gained notoriety for his daring prison escapes using helicopters. He was initially sentenced to a 30-year jail term for a murder committed during the robbery of a security van in 1997. He escaped two times with a helicopter. After his second escape he was captured on 21 September 2007.[96][97][98] |
2007, 14 July | Prison in Grasse | ![]() | |||
John Dillinger (1903–1934) | 2 | 1933, 13 October | Allen County Jail | ![]() |
He was a notorious bank robber who operated throughout the Midwest during the Great Depression. He broke out of the Allen County Jail in Lima, Ohio by having his gang pose as officers and infiltrate the prison. Only a few months later, the gang was re-captured when the hotel they were staying in caught fire. He was incarcerated while waiting to stand trial for the murder of a police officer in a bank robbery. |
1934, 3 March | Lake County Jail | ![]() |
Officials boasted that the Lake County Jail in Crown Point, Indiana was escape-proof and posted extra guards, but he escaped using a fake gun. | ||
Richard Matt (1967–2015) | 2 | 1986, 13 October | Erie County Correction Facility | ![]() |
In 1986, at age 19, Matt was convicted and sentenced to a year in jail. The term was interrupted when Matt, taking advantage of a guard's mistake, slipped out of his cell, scaled a 9-foot brick and metal wall topped with razor wire and hopped a freight train to his brother's house in Tonawanda. Five days later, police officers found him brandishing an ax handle in his brother's apartment. |
2015, 6 June | Clinton Correctional Facility | ![]() |
On 6 June 2015, inmates Richard Matt and David Sweat, both serving sentences for murder, escaped from the facility. A prison employee, Joyce Mitchell, was charged with aiding their escape. Matt was shot and killed by police on 26 June 2015. | ||
Jiří Kajínek (born 1961) | 2 | 1994, 3 July | České Budějovice Remand Prison | ![]() |
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2000, 29 October | Mírov Prison | ![]() |
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Joaquín Guzmán Loera (born 1954 or 1957) | 2 | 2001, 19 January | "Puente Grande" Federal Center for Social Rehabilitation No. 2 | ![]() |
On 19 January 2001, Francisco "El Chito" Camberos Rivera, a prison guard, opened Guzmán's electronically operated cell door, and Guzmán got in a laundry cart that maintenance worker Javier Camberos rolled through several doors and eventually out the front door. He was then transported in the trunk of a car driven by Camberos out of the town. The escape allegedly cost Guzmán $2.5 million.[99] |
2015, 11 July | "Altiplano" Federal Social Readaptation Center No. 1 | ![]() |
In his second escape from the prison, he escaped through a tunnel leading from the shower area to a home construction site 1.5 km (0.9 mi) away in a Santa Juanita neighborhood. The tunnel was 1.7 m (5.7 ft) tall and 75 cm (30 in) in width. It was equipped with artificial light, air conditioning, and high-quality construction materials.[100] | ||
Frank Abagnale (born 1948) | 2 | British VC-10 airliner (while deporting) | ![]() |
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1971, April | Federal Detention Center, Atlanta, Georgia | ![]() |
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Philip Andrew Marshall | 6 | 2018, 19 February | Bedford County Jail, Shelbyville, Tennessee | ![]() |
Escaped six times over the years. |
Zdzisław Najmrodzki (1954–1995) | 2 | 1980, 23 July | Gliwice Prison | ![]() |
Najmrodzki was a famous robber and thief, known for escaping 29 times from the prison and the authorities. He was one of the most wanted criminals in the Polish People's Republic.[101] |
1989, 3 September | |||||
José Adolfo Macías Villamar (born 1979) | 2 | 2013, February | La Roca, maximum security prison in Guayas Penitentiary Complex | ![]() |
Macías was on the run with 17 others until being caught in May, 2013.[79] |
2024, 7 January | La Regional prison in the Guayas Penitentiary Complex | ![]() |
This prison escape initiated the 2024 conflict in Ecuador. |
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