John Paul Scott (born in 1926 in Leitchfield, Kentucky, died February 22, 1986 behind bars in Tallahassee, Florida) was the only inmate of Alcatraz to conclusively reach the San Francisco shore by floating. Scott was convicted of bank robbery and the possession of unregistered firearms in Lexington and sentenced to 30 years in prison.[1]
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John Paul Scott was shipped to Alcatraz Island in 1959 and became #AZ2403. On December 16, 1962 he tried to escape from the island together with Darl Lee Park, a convicted bank robber and hijacker (sentenced to 52 years). The two bent the bars of a window in the latrine of the cellblock, roped down, and made it to the water. They then attempted to float to the San Francisco Shore. For that purpose, they made water wings from stolen rubber boots. The escape was noticed at 5:47 a.m.[2] Park had to give up after a short time and was recaptured 20 minutes after the escape was discovered on the rock formation Little Alcatraz, which lies 10 yards from Alcatraz Island.
Although the Coast Guard was searching the bay, they failed to find Scott. At 7:40 a.m., the Presidio Military police got a call from four teenagers who found an unconscious person at Fort Point beneath the Golden Gate Bridge. That person was John Paul Scott, suffering from hypothermia and exhaustion. After recovering in the Letterman General Hospital, he was returned to Alcatraz.
It seemed impossible to escape from Alcatraz by swimming: The seasonal water temperature in the Bay is about 13°C (46°F) in December and there is a current of up to 10 knots (5,4 km/h). Citing these facts and myths of "man-eating" sharks and razor-sharp rocks, prison officers scared prisoners from trying to escape. When Frank Morris and brothers John and Clarence Anglin disappeared half a year earlier, the prison officials stated that they had drowned (although the FBI just called them missing). Due to Scott's escape, this line of reasoning was shaken. For the first time it was proven that a prisoner swam approximately three miles to the shore[3]. Many people considered that Morris and the Anglin brothers might have survived.
After the closing of Alcatraz, Scott was transferred to Leavenworth, later on to Marion, Illinois, where he made another escape attempt. He died 1986 in the Federal Correctional Institution, Tallahassee, Florida.