creating a disturbance in the cell house . . . had his coveralls off and was beating the floor with them”
Richard Neumer
9/21 to 10/3/37
“At intervals of 45 minutes to an hour he would start clapping his hands, yelling, and whistling. This continued from midnight until 6 AM .”
Ludwig Schmidt
9/23 to 10/4/37
For insolence and making threats
Charles Bequette
9/24 to 10/5/37
“He wanted all the privileges that other prisoners had in other institutions”
Harmon Waley
9/27 to 10/10/37
For participating in a strike and “creating a disturbance in the isolation section of the cell house”
John H. Carroll
9/28 to 10/8/37
For participating again in a strike and for “trying to remove his toilet bowl from a wall in a solitary dark cell”
Bob Phillips
9/28 to 10/9/37
Agitating, yelling, creating a disturbance in isolation
George Sink
6/4 to 6/5/38
7/9 to 7/11/38
7/22 to 7/24/38
12/8 to 12/9/38
For various infractions
Frank Brownie
8 days [dates unknown]
“Agitating” [joining a work strike]
Source:
Information abstracted from prisoner files.
Continuous hollering and agitating;
Causing commotion in the cell house by hollering and [for] his free use of obscene language directed at Warden Johnston. While being taken to lower solitary, Sink broke away from Lt. Starling and Jr. Officer Roberts as they entered through the basement door and ran about 20 feet. He picked up a window sash weight and threw it at Lt. Starling. Lt. Starling hit [Sink] with his gas billy [a heavy 9½-inch metal club with tear gas], which went off, the gas striking Sink in the face.
Making so much noise the Associate Warden [usually, “deputy warden”] could hear it while at his house eating dinner. 6
George Sink was the last prisoner to be sent to lower solitary; his misconduct represented that mixture of disciplinary and mental health issues that characterized a small number of Alcatraz prisoners. After he accumulated twenty-nine disciplinary reports during a two-year period on the island, a neuropsychiatric board diagnosed him as “paranoid” and “psychotic”; he was transferred shortly thereafter to the Federal Medical Center at Springfield, Missouri, for treatment.
In June 1938 Warden Johnston described the problem in dealing with Sink’s disruptive behavior in a letter to Director James Bennett:
when in Solitary, he became very noisy and made repeated efforts to disturb all other occupants of the cell house. After consultation of the Associate Warden and Chief Physician, Sink was removed to the Hospital, but there heproved to be a disturbing factor, upsetting other patients and participating in two fights. Dr. Ritchey checked him out of the hospital and reported him as one who should be held to account and subject to disciplinary action.
The Associate Warden placed him in Open Cell, just for purposes of segregation, and gave him two meals a day. On the night of June 4, 1938, he began yelling and disturbing the occupants of other cells in the several cell blocks. . . . He was so resistant to all appeals to keep quiet that the Lieutenant of the Watch sent for the Associate Warden. Failing to get Sink to stop, he finally removed him to the Basement Solitary.
When you are here on your next visit I would like to show you the Basement and have your advice concerning what alterations are advisable in order to make occasional use of the basement cells for just such instances as I have named above. 7
Four years after the Bureau of Prisons took custody of the island, Johnston was still informing Bureau headquarters of the existence of, and need for, “the basement cells.” 8
FROM LOWER SOLITARY TO
THE SPECIAL TREATMENT UNIT
Noise making was the primary offense that earned prisoners trips to lower solitary during the 1930s. No inmate involved in an escape plot or attempt or who assaulted or killed another prisoner or an officer was ever placed in the dungeon; even Burton Phillips, who attacked Warden Johnston in the
Richard Neumer
9/21 to 10/3/37
“At intervals of 45 minutes to an hour he would start clapping his hands, yelling, and whistling. This continued from midnight until 6 AM .”
Ludwig Schmidt
9/23 to 10/4/37
For insolence and making threats
Charles Bequette
9/24 to 10/5/37
“He wanted all the privileges that other prisoners had in other institutions”
Harmon Waley
9/27 to 10/10/37
For participating in a strike and “creating a disturbance in the isolation section of the cell house”
John H. Carroll
9/28 to 10/8/37
For participating again in a strike and for “trying to remove his toilet bowl from a wall in a solitary dark cell”
Bob Phillips
9/28 to 10/9/37
Agitating, yelling, creating a disturbance in isolation
George Sink
6/4 to 6/5/38
7/9 to 7/11/38
7/22 to 7/24/38
12/8 to 12/9/38
For various infractions
Frank Brownie
8 days [dates unknown]
“Agitating” [joining a work strike]
Source:
Information abstracted from prisoner files.
Continuous hollering and agitating;
Causing commotion in the cell house by hollering and [for] his free use of obscene language directed at Warden Johnston. While being taken to lower solitary, Sink broke away from Lt. Starling and Jr. Officer Roberts as they entered through the basement door and ran about 20 feet. He picked up a window sash weight and threw it at Lt. Starling. Lt. Starling hit [Sink] with his gas billy [a heavy 9½-inch metal club with tear gas], which went off, the gas striking Sink in the face.
Making so much noise the Associate Warden [usually, “deputy warden”] could hear it while at his house eating dinner. 6
George Sink was the last prisoner to be sent to lower solitary; his misconduct represented that mixture of disciplinary and mental health issues that characterized a small number of Alcatraz prisoners. After he accumulated twenty-nine disciplinary reports during a two-year period on the island, a neuropsychiatric board diagnosed him as “paranoid” and “psychotic”; he was transferred shortly thereafter to the Federal Medical Center at Springfield, Missouri, for treatment.
In June 1938 Warden Johnston described the problem in dealing with Sink’s disruptive behavior in a letter to Director James Bennett:
when in Solitary, he became very noisy and made repeated efforts to disturb all other occupants of the cell house. After consultation of the Associate Warden and Chief Physician, Sink was removed to the Hospital, but there heproved to be a disturbing factor, upsetting other patients and participating in two fights. Dr. Ritchey checked him out of the hospital and reported him as one who should be held to account and subject to disciplinary action.
The Associate Warden placed him in Open Cell, just for purposes of segregation, and gave him two meals a day. On the night of June 4, 1938, he began yelling and disturbing the occupants of other cells in the several cell blocks. . . . He was so resistant to all appeals to keep quiet that the Lieutenant of the Watch sent for the Associate Warden. Failing to get Sink to stop, he finally removed him to the Basement Solitary.
When you are here on your next visit I would like to show you the Basement and have your advice concerning what alterations are advisable in order to make occasional use of the basement cells for just such instances as I have named above. 7
Four years after the Bureau of Prisons took custody of the island, Johnston was still informing Bureau headquarters of the existence of, and need for, “the basement cells.” 8
FROM LOWER SOLITARY TO
THE SPECIAL TREATMENT UNIT
Noise making was the primary offense that earned prisoners trips to lower solitary during the 1930s. No inmate involved in an escape plot or attempt or who assaulted or killed another prisoner or an officer was ever placed in the dungeon; even Burton Phillips, who attacked Warden Johnston in the
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