Tangled Web UK Review October 2008
The E..... List: Notorious Prison Escapes: 1 by
Paul Buck
hbk out October 08
Published by Pennant Books
at £14.99
‘As the prisons of Britain grow desperately overcrowded, now is the time to consider escape,’ Paul Buck writes controversially at the start of his latest book. He goes on to outline hundreds of notorious escapes from jails as diverse as Alcatraz, San Quentin and Sing Sing to our very own Brixton and Dartmoor.
Some men went to extreme lengths in their bid for freedom, with one prisoner drinking disinfectant to make himself ill so that he was transferred to the comparatively-lax prison hospital. Another dieted until he could squeeze into the crawlspace in the ceiling and make his way into the outside world.
Many of the cases are historical, with prisoners risking death to escape from appalling conditions or brutal chain gangs. When captured, they paid dearly for their temerity. Willie Sutton, a bank robber who had never been violent, escaped in 1947 when he was months away from parole. Caught and returned to court, he was sentenced to an additional twenty five years.
The author and I share a publisher and have exchanged emails and he’s told me that his focus from the start was about the escapades themselves. As such, the reader learns comparatively little about the escapee or his crime but everything about the process: where he dug his way out, what he used, who was waiting for him on the other side. The book is subtitled Notorious Prison Escapes and does exactly what it says on the tin.
Some chapters are crammed full of cases, so if you’re not interested in Nordin Benallal’s fourth escape from a Belgian jail by scaling a 25 foot wall, then you only have to turn the page to reach Vassilis Paleokosta's helicopter flight from an Athens penitentiary.
You’ll find well known escapees here such as Ted Bundy, Marc Dutroux and Ronnie Biggs as well as many lesser known - but equally determined - prisoners who made a bid for freedom. Chillingly, some murdered prison officers and civilians because they stood in their way or because they enjoyed the kill.
There’s also a case of political correctness gone mad, in which a prisoner from Peterhead scaled a perimeter fence and fell, breaking both legs. He claimed that the guards were throwing pieces of concrete at him and was awarded £35,608 compensation.
(
Carol Anne Davis
Author of Children Who Kill)
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