Alcatraz Bilateral Commission on Prison Reform - Positions

Prisoners

Position A: Bernard Coy Coy was sentenced to 25 years for bank robbery with a sawed off shotgun in 1937. He turned to robbery when he fell on hard times during the Depression. He was moved to Alcatraz from Atlanta in 1938 and was given the job of cell-house orderly, which gave him a relatively large amount of freedom around the cell block. He is more intelligent than the average prisoner at Alcatraz, with understanding of basic security systems and lock breaking. His skills as a bank robber mean that his relative “freedom” is closely watched by the guards, who are suspicious that he could attempt an escape. Hopefully for the guards, he will be as bad at breaking out of places as he is breaking into places. He did get caught, after all.

Position C: Joseph Cretzer West Coast gangster and member of the Cretzer-Kyle Gang. By 1939 he had risen to Public Enemy No. 4 for his robbery and gang activities. He was sentenced to 25 years for murder in 1940 and was transferred to Alcatraz after two escape attempts in the first few months of his sentence, one of which resulted in another murder charge. In 1941 he along with Sam Shockley, Arnold Kyle, and Lloyd Barkdoll attempted an escape from Alcatraz from one of the island’s workshops. For this attempt, he was sentenced to serve five years in the high-security D Block, where prisoners were confined to their cells most of the time. He is one of the more brutal and cunning prisoners, and has proven to have a habit of attempting unsuccessful escapes. It seems that five years in confinement did nothing to curb his temper, and he has a deep hatred of law enforcement officers and “the system” in general.

Position E: Marvin Hubbard Hubbard pled guilty in 1942 to kidnapping a Chattanooga police officer and transporting him across state lines. In the process, he also stole a Tommy gun, two revolvers, and a car. In September of 1942 he escaped from the Knoxville county jail and was moved to Atlanta, where Bernard Coy had been a few years prior. There he participated in a mutiny and was sent to Alcatraz in 1944. He was given the job of kitchen orderly and was seen as one of the less dangerous prisoners and more of a follower than a leader. However, he has an almost reckless disregard for both the law and his own life, and has a habit of relieving people of their possessions without their knowledge (pickpocketing). His sticky fingers might put the talks in jeopardy if he takes the wrong thing from the wrong person.

Position G: Sam Shockley was arrested in 1938 in Oklahoma on charges of bank robbery and kidnapping. He was sentenced to life imprisonment. When examined by prison psychiatrists, he was found to have an IQ of 54, an unstable character, and was prone to violent rages. He was then transferred to Alcatraz where the strict routine would be more able to manage him. However, even there he was deemed uncontrollable and spent most of his time in D Block. He joined in on the escape attempt in 1941 with Joseph Cretzer, Arnold Kyle, and LLoyd Barkdoll. His violent rages make him the most unstable of the prisoners invited to the talks, and nobody is even really sure why he was included Rumor was he threatened to “remove” another inmate if he was not given a seat at the table. Shockley does not need a gun or a weapon to inflict damage or even kill someone who triggers his temper. It seems that only his former co-conspirator Cretzer, who is also predisposed to violence, is able to keep him under any sort of control. Birds of a feather flock together, or so the saying goes.

Position I: Clarence Carnes Also known as “The Choctaw Kid”, Carnes best known as the youngest inmate incarcerated at Alcatraz. He was sentenced in 1943 to life in prison at age 16 for murdering a service station attendant during an attempted hold up in Oklahoma. Two years later he attempted to escape from the Granite Reformatory with a few other prisoners, commandeering a truck with an elderly couple inside while on the run. Kidnapping and escape charges were added to his sentencing, adding 99 more years. He was sent to Leavenworth after the attempt, but tried to escape again while in the custody of the U.S. Marshals. He was transferred to Alcatraz with another 5 years tacked onto his sentence for good measure. He was assessed by psychiatrists at Alcatraz and was found to have a psychopathic personality, emotional instability, and an IQ of 93. He has no real skills aside from committing criminal activity, but his youth made his participation in the talks important and necessary.

Position K: Miran Thompson Thompson is an escape artist of the worst kind - he has been arrested at least eight times and been held in small jails, and has escaped every time. However, Thompson doesn’t have as much luck staying out of jail as he does getting out of jail. When he was transferred to Alcatraz, he was serving a life sentence plus 99 years for kidnapping and the murder of a Texas police office. He also committed armed robberies in New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas, and Oklahoma. At Alcatraz, he is under almost constant surveillance for his past successful escapes and his time outside or in the main cell block is limited. However, he seems to have accepted his lot in life and seems eager to discuss reforming conditions within Alcatraz.

Position M: John K. Giles Giles is famous among the Alcatraz prisoners for his almost successful escape attempt early in 1945. He was sentenced to the US Penitentiary in 1935 for the attempted robbery of the Denver and Rio Grande Western mail train. That crime was committed while he was on the run after escaping from an Oregon prison, where he was serving a life sentence for murder. He began serving his sentence on McNeil Island, but due to his escape record and length of his sentence, he was transferred to Alcatraz a few months after his initial sentencing. While working in the laundry that was contracted to clean army uniforms, Giles was able to steal an entire Army uniform one part at a time and attempted to board an Army ferry leaving Alcatraz. However, he was apprehended on Angel Island and sent back to Alcatraz. Giles is one of the more intelligent prisoners, his craftiness surpassing even Coy’s. He is somewhat of a loner, as shown by his solo escape attempt, but he is a valuable asset and a clear head that the prisoners can rely on to convey their needs and wants during the talks. It is likely, however, that Giles may try to advance his own interests at the expense of the prisoners as a whole if he believes it will benefit him.

Position O: Huron Ted Walters Walters, better known by the moniker “Terrible Ted”, is a former member of the Hamilton gang that terrorized the Southwest in the 1930s. He spent time in Leavenworth before being transferred to Alcatraz in the early 1940s. During the hunt for him and his partner Floyd Hamilton, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover wrote: “The operations of Floyd Hamilton and Huron Ted Walters are similar to those of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow. They are heavily armed and have stated that they will not surrender without a fight.” In 1943 he made an attempt at escaping from Alcatraz by scaling a fence and hiding in a tidal cave. Initially presumed dead by prison officials, he was found a few days later and returned to Alcatraz. Four months later he tried to escape again, climbing a fence by the laundry. He fell from the fence and injured his spine, and was thus unable to finish the escape. He was subsequently sent to solitary confinement. His escape attempts put him in contact with Giles in the laundry and the two have become good friends. He has also regularly commiserted with Miran Thompson about their failed escape attempts and bad luck. Walters is known as a loose cannon that has sworn that once he gets out of prison, he would rather died in a shootout rather than be taken by the cops.

Position Q: Alvin “Creepy” Karpis You know you’re a bad man when your fellow inmates call you “Creepy”. Creepy was one of the three leaders of the Ma Barker-Karpis Gang and was America’s last Public Enemy No. 1 and was personally taken down by J. Edgar Hoover. Earning his nickname due to his sinister smile , he was accused of ten murders, six kidnappings, and a bank robbery. He was personally taken down by Hoover and was known for mocking the director for being unable to catch him. He was sentenced to life in prison and has been behind bars at Alcatraz since 1936. He has had the most time of any of the inmates to learn how the prison works and any security flaws that may have been overlooked. He is intelligent, reckless, psychopathic, and utterly without a moral compass. Though some may consider him a loose cannon, everything he does is done with surgical precision and calculation. You don’t avoid J. Edgar Hoover for that long without being at least one step ahead at all times. You can assume that both Creepy and Giles have some sort of ulterior plan and have other reasons for participating in the reform talks.

Position S: George “Machine Gun” Kelly Barnes Better known by his nickname, Machine Gun Kelly, Barnes was one of the most notorious gangsters of the Prohibition Era. His nickname and image, largely created by his wife, stemmed from his love of his favorite weapon, a Thompson machine gun. He landed himself in Alcatraz for the famous kidnapping of oil tycoon Charles F. Urschel, collecting a $200,000 dollar ransom (almost $4 million in 2018). He became Public Enemy No. 1, but surrendered without a fight when the FBI raided his hideout. He was caught in his pajamas without a weapon. He arrived in Alcatraz in 1934 and has been considered a model inmate ever since. He has a perfect record, not getting into any fights or acting tough like some of the other inmates. He currently works in the laundry and recently took a job as an altar boy in the prison chapel. Most of the inmates and guards like him, except for the truly psychopathic ones like Carnes and Shockley, who think he’s hiding his true nature. Nevertheless, he is a very well-read, soft spoken man who will listen to all opinions at the table and could very well take on the role of peacemaker if it comes to it.

Position U: Robert “The Birdman” Stroud When you’re known as “Alcatraz’ Most Feared Inmate,” you have to have done something exceptionally bad. A self-taught ornithologist, Stroud was initially sentenced to 12 years in prison for killing a bartender in a drunken brawl and incarcerated at McNeil Island Federal Prison. At McNeil, he attacked a hospital orderly and stabbed a fellow inmate, at which time he was transferred to Leavenworth. At Leavenworth, he stabbed a guard to death after being told his brother could not visit. A lethal combination of intelligence and a massively short temper, Stroud was included in the talks mainly because he threatened to kill someone if he wasn’t included. Rumor has it that he struck a deal with the Warden to allow Stroud to keep a couple birds in exchange for his good behavior at the talks. Stroud earned his nickname at Leavenworth, where he kept canaries and other birds as companions. It seems like the only living beings that do not enrage him are birds. Due to his violent habits, he is not allowed to have a cellmate at Alcatraz. He has also spend more time in solitary confinement than anyone else. He has been productive during that time though, writing and publishing Digest on the Diseases of Birds. ​ ​

Position W: Henri Young Convicted in 1941 of stabbing fellow inmate Rufus McCain to death, Young had a long history of violent criminal activity that landed him in Alcatraz in 1936. He was a bank robber who had taken and brutalized hostages on at least one occasion, committing murder in 1933. He was incarcerated in state prisons in Montana and Washington before being transferred to McNeil Island. He along with four other prisoners attempted to escape in 1939, and after they were recaptured, Young was held in D Block for a few months. It was partially because of Young’s stabbing of McCain that led to questions about how the prison was run and what reforms could or should be implemented. Young has been brought into the talks to testify on why and how he was able to kill another inmate when weapons are restricted and guards are everywhere. He is a rather quiet and sullen inmate, preferring to speak in nods, shakes of the head, and one word sentences. However, he can be quiet verbose when provoked, known to shout strings of profanity at inmates and guards without warning.

Officers

Position B: James A. Johnston Johnston has been serving a warden of Alcatraz since it opened in 1934, and was involved in the initial design of the prison. He is considered to be a highly strict disciplinarian and a devout reformist. One of his first reforms was imposing a strict code of silence, which earned him the nickname the “Golden Rule Warden.” He was relatively popular amongst the inmates and guards and challenged traditional barbaric prison tactics such as straight jackets and solitary confinement in darkness. He attended meals with the inmates unguarded, despite being assaulted in 1937 by an inmate during a worker’s strike. He is a voice for the prisoners and an advocate for reform, and the prisoners see him as their best chance for improvements in the prison. The other guards and some of the military higher-ups think he is too soft and would prefer a more authoritarian approach to running the prison.

Position D: Frank Merrill Merrill is a general in the Army and is best known for commanding the 5307th Composite Unit in the Burma Campaign of World War II, also known as Merrill’s Marauders. His unit came under General Joe Stilwell’s Northern Combat Area Command, which was a special forces unit trained to operate from bases deep behind Japanese lines. He became military attache in Tokyo in 1938 and speaks fluent Japanese. He was promoted to major general in 1944 at the age of 40, making one of the youngest American generals since the Civil War. He and his unit engaged in combat with the Japanese Army on thirty-two separate occasions and had traversed more jungle than any other U.S. Army unit of the war. After the unit was disbanded in 1944, Merrill was assigned to the headquarters of the 6th Army in San Francisco under Stilwell. Merrill is much more of a disciplinarian than Johnston, and is only reigned in by the seniority and temperance of Stillwell. He is brilliant, ambitious, and an excellent soldier, but his time in Japan left him with little patience for questions or insubordination. As one of the newer prison guards, Merrill is assigned menial tasks, making him hate his job to a certain degree.

Position F: Joe “Vinegar” Stilwell Stilwell is an Army General that also served in the China Burma India Theater during World War II. His caustic personality earned him the name “Vinegar Joe”. However, he has a cool head and is able to reign in his more inflammatory colleague, General Merrill. He attended and later taught at West Point and served in World War I as an intelligence officer. He is fluent in both spoken and written Chinese and is fluent in French. His leadership style changed in 1940 and 1941, shifting to concern for the average soldier and minimized ceremonies and discipline. This earned him the much nicer nickname of “Uncle Joe.” During World War II he became Chief of Staff to Chiang Kai-Shek and was responsible for all Lend-Lease supplies going to China. He was reassigned to San Francisco after some conflicts between China and the United States, and assumed command of the 6th Army. He is one of the best leaders the Army has to offer, and a voice of both reason and reality when it comes to what should be expected from prison reform. He is also skeptical of any of the prisoners who are eager and helpful during the process.

Position H: Harold Stites Harold Stites is a Senior Officer at Alcatraz who previously served in the U.S. Army during World War I. Stites was posted at a watchtower when three inmates murdered Officer Royal Cline during an escape attempt in 1938. The inmates attempted to take the watchtower, forcing Stites to fire his weapons, killing one and wounding the other. Killing the inmate never sat well with him, and he has not fired his weapon at an inmate since. His time in the Army instilled a “law and order” mentality in Stites and a high sense of morality that are often in conflict. On one hand, he wants to help the reform and hopes better prison conditions will help inmates readjust to civic life after release. On the other hand, he realized that the men in Alcatraz are some of the worst criminals in the country and deserve to be there for the crimes they have committed. He is close with the other officers, but feels like the senior officers do not take into account the needs and opinions of the everyday officers.

Position J: E.J. Miller Edward J. Miller is the Associate Warden at Alcatraz. He began his time at Alcatraz as a Corrections Officer, and was promoted to Associate Warden by the end of the 1930s. He once got into a verbal altercation with a prisoner who complained that the rules at Alcatraz violated Bureau of Prisons guidelines, to which Miller responded: “You don’t run Alcatraz. I run Alcatraz.” He later refused the same prisoner a Bible when the prisoner was transferred to D Block. He is much more of a disciplinarian than Johnston, and is the “bad cop” to Johnston’s “good cop.” Miller will most likely advocate against too much reform or allowances, believing that the prisoners ended up in Alcatraz for a reason and do not deserve the niceties of life.

Position L: James V. Bennett James Bennett is the current director of the Bureau of Prisons. He has taken special time out of his schedule to come to Alcatraz to participate in the talks regarding the reform of the most notorious prison in America. He is a veteran of the U.S. Army Air Corps and served as the assistant director for the BOP from 1930-1937. He drafted much of the legislation that affected Federal corrections and responsible for the development and full implementation of the BOP’s inmate classification system. He is largely hated by the inmates, as they view his classification system as one reason why they ended up in Alcatraz in the first place. However, he is a fair director and is very interested in reforming the system and getting input from both inmates and officers alike. He holds the most sway of anyone with legislators outside the committee, and has the ability to affect policy and shape legislation, provided that he can get the two parties to agree on anything.

Position N: Cecil Corwin Cecil Corwin is a Corrections Officer at Alcatraz who works in the main cellhouse. He has worked at the prison for several years and knows many of the inmates. He is known for smuggling in letters and writing material to the inmates to correspond with their families outside - making him very popular among the inmates. While it is against prison rules, the other officers turn a blind eye because it keeps the inmates happy and gives them something to do. Cecil has a soft spot for criminals, as his younger brother was incarcerated for a few months and treated poorly. He is a strong advocate for reform, but his kindness leaves him open to manipulation by the hardened criminals at Alcatraz.

Position P: Burt Burch Burt Burch is a Corrections Officer at Alcatraz and has been working as a corrections officer since the prison opened. He has been around the block, working in several prisons until he asked to be transferred to Alcatraz. He has seen all sorts of criminals and has no patience for any sort of nonsense or back talk, and wishes that the prisons would return to the good old days when corporal punishment was allowed and the Corrections Officers had more leniency in dealing with prisoners. He is strongly opposed to any sort of prison reform, as he believes that it will only embolden the criminals to act out as soon as they are released from prison. He normally patrols the gun gallery on the upper level so he can observe all of the goings-on around the main cellhouse. It also allows him to be lazy and smoke on the job, as he does not have to deal with much direct interaction with the prisoners. Nonetheless, he thinks that most of the prisoners are deadbeats and keeping them in Alcatraz is doing them a favor. He would much prefer they be sent back to the harsher state prisons.

Position R: William A. Miller After his father was shot in a bank robbery gone wrong, Miller’s family fell on hard times and had to sell their home. They moved in with his aunt and uncle, where Miller learned one lesson he carried with him for the rest of his life: all criminals are dogs and should be treated as such. He does not believe that the reform talks should even be happening and that the prisoners made their choice when they chose to break the law. Miller had to start working from a young age, and ended up as a Corrections Officer in the most notorious prison in the United States. He takes great pleasure in his job, knowing that he is keeping criminals off the streets and making sure no other little boys grow up the way he did. Though corporal punishment is not allowed at Alcatraz, that doesn’t stop Miller. He knows that the prisoners won’t say anything - they don’t want to be beaten worse or called weak by the other inmates. He is one of the most brutal guards at Alcatraz, but he’s relatively cordial with the other guards. He’s just there to do his job, and make sure these criminals get exactly what they earned.

Position T: Thomas Campbell Clark Clark, who prefers Tom C. Clark over his full name, is the 59th Attorney General of the United States. He is a friend of Warden Johnston and was involved in the sentencing of many of the criminals at Alcatraz during his time as Deputy Attorney General. Clark hopes that the reform talks will make things easier on everyone and reduce the number of repeat offenders that end up back in the system. He is a close personal friend of Harry Truman, though these days their careers keep them from visiting very often. Clark prefers to listen and observe rather than to make his voice heard, but he will not hesitate to speak up if something is important to him. He has earned a reputation as a quiet, intelligent scholar and a reasonable man that wants to see the Justice Department improved and streamlined. If the Alcatraz reforms can be applied to other prisons, then Clark will be a very happy man.

Position V: Paul D. Madigan Paul D. Madigan originally served as a corrections officer in Alcatraz from the time it opened until the early 1940s. He was then promoted up the chain to associate warden along with EJ Miller, making Madigan the only person to work his way up from the bottom of the ranks of the prison staff to upper management. He is probably the person who knows Alcatraz best, inside and out. In 1941 he was a key to thwarting an escape attempt after being held hostage in the Model Industries Building, which led to his promotion to Associate Warden. He is a devout Irish Catholic with a fondness for pipes, and his known to sneak tobacco to some of the more well-behaved inmates. He is known for being more lenient and softer in his approach to administration and was better liked by the prison staff, providing a good balance between the more disciplinarian styles of Johnston and Miller. Madigan will be a good link between the inmates and the officers and his genial nature and willingness to compromise may be the best chance the talks have for coming to a peaceful and fruitful resolution.

Position X: Edwin “Cowboy” Swope Edwin B. Swope, nicknamed “Cowboy”, is the Warden of McNeil Island Federal Penitentiary, where many of the Alcatraz prisoners were previously held. Previously Chairman of the City Commission of Albuquerque, New Mexico, he joined the federal prison system after a later stint as Commissioner of Public Lands in New Mexico. He first became Warden at New Mexico State Prison and later Warden of the Federal Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana. He was “promoted” to Warden at McNeil, dealing with some of the most brutal and vicious prisoners in the United States. Several of the McNeil prisoners were on their way to Alcatraz or had been released from Alcatraz to a lower-level prison. He is a soft spoken man whose fashion choices included a sombrero, cowboy boots, and turquoise belt buckles. He introduced some reforms into McNeil, giving the inmates some creative freedom of expression. He believed that giving inmates artistic or intellectual outlets would help them readjust once they re-entered society. He is key to these talks as McNeil is one of the biggest feeders to Alcatraz, and some of the reforms Swope put in place at McNeil could be implemented successfully at Alcatraz.

Position Z: Arthur M. Dollison Dollison became a guard at Leavenworth in 1938 and worked his way up to become Associate Warden by 1942. After a brief tour in World War II where he ended up shot in the leg, he returned to his position at Leavenworth. Now walking with a noticeable limp, he became very grouchy and had a habit of yelling at both inmates and guards for small infractions. However, he never lifted a hand against any of the prisoners, preferring to let his guards dole out the corporal punishment for serious infractions. He was more bark than bite, to be honest. Until he landed his position at Leavenworth in 1938, he was only able to find part time work due to the Great Depression. Dollison can sympathize with many of the inmates, who only turned to crime because they fell on hard times during the Depression and saw no other way out. Nevertheless, he is opposed to major reforms because, in his view, “I was able to get through the Depression without robbing a bank.” He has a rather pretentious air and looks down on many of the inmates, who are from a rougher background than the college-educated Dollison.