Joseph Bowers Joseph Bowers Joseph "Dutch" Bowers (December 13, 1896 – April 27, 1936) was the first man to attempt an escape from Alcatraz prison. On 27 April 1936, convict Henry Larry claims to have watched Bowers, who was feeding seagulls, stack some empty barrels and climb up next to the fence so he could retrieve a bit of food which had fallen on the barbed wire. He stood there feeding the birds for several minutes until a tower guard turned, saw him atop the fence, and fired on the convict. Bowers fell seventy feet to his death on the rocks below.
Folsom State Prison Rehabilitation, local law enforcement agencies, and the California Highway Patrol joined the search for the two men, who were apprehended in Inglewood, CA on November 22, 2010. Inmate Todd Willis walked away about 8 a.m. from a minimum-security housing facility at the prison; a few days later on October 31, 2017, an off duty officer was driving through Rancho Cordova when she spotted someone she recognized as an inmate who walked away from Folsom State Prison five days earlier. Police were contacted and Willis was quickly apprehended. In 1937, Warden Clarence Larkin, was stabbed during an escape attempt and died