9. The Escape Begins
The four men, all of whom had spent time at Atlanta State Penitentiary (three of them simultaneously), were housed in cells adjacent to each other. This arrangement was probably an oversight (or at least a lack of foresight) on the part of the prison administration, but the place was supposed to be completely escape-proof. After all, the people who went to Alcatraz usually had “escape attempt” on their RAP sheets. What the adjacent rooms did was provide the men with a means of working on their plan together. The extreme detail, along with incredible ingenuity that they paid to every single aspect of their escape plan has gone down in history.
Old saw blades were quite common at Alcatraz, as the authorities put the prisoners to work making things like furniture. Allen West realized the potential that they held and smuggled some back to their cells. Because the four prisoners were there for escape attempts, as opposed to violent crimes, the guards didn’t pay much attention to them when they were in their cells. They used these blades to begin sawing through the walls between their cells so that they could start planning and executing their escape. Without those saw blades, the exit may not have ever happened.