Avanti Centrae on A Prison Escape and Inspiration
Avanti Centrae is the author of the Van Ops series and other thrillers. You can find out more about her on her website: www.avanticentrae.com
1987. Glen Stewart Godwin is incarcerated inside Folsom State Prison. With the facility’s imposing granite walls and high guard towers, escape seems unlikely.
But as I learned while researching my latest thriller, The Picasso Job, not only did Godwin escape, but he remains at large to this day.
Folsom State Prison was built along the American River, not far from downtown Sacramento. Following the population growth of the Gold Rush, it opened in 1880. At that time, prisoners had no light in their cells, nor heat. Perhaps worse, no plumbing! Air holes weren’t added until 1940. The granite walls were completed in 1923. Before the fortifications were finished, numerous prisoners attempted to sneak past the tall towers.
One of the earliest recorded escapes was in 1920, while the walls were being built. Three prisoners hijacked a construction train and smashed it through the prison gate. It didn’t end well for them.
In 1932, an inmate named Carl Reese tried to escape by fashioning a diving suit out of a football bladder. He drowned in the powerhouse mill pond because he didn’t make his breathing tube long enough.
1937 brought a riot to the prison. The warden was killed and two inmates tried to take advantage of the melee by attempting escape. They were fatally shot.
Fast forward to the eighties. Godwin, a convicted murderer, managed to smuggle a hacksaw and other tools into the prison. He cut a hole in a fence and escaped through a storm drain that led to the American River. To aid his escape, either his wife or an accomplice painted arrows on rocks to guide him on his way. After crawling through the midnight-black storm drain for 750 feet, Godwin made it out of the prison grounds and into a waiting raft on the nearby river. Both an accomplice and Godwin’s wife were arrested in 1991 in Mexico, and Godwin was also apprehended. The fugitive later escaped from a prison in Guadalajara. To this day, he has a prime spot on the FBI’s most wanted list, making his Folsom Prison escape one of the most daring and successful in the facility’s history.
My thriller begins with an escape similar to Godwin’s. To fund their freedom, three fugitives embark on a kamikaze drive across country with a Picasso painting in their sights. As with my prior VanOps novels, and CLEOPATRA’S VENDETTA, this one has been a blast to research. Sign up for my newsletter on my website, www.avanticentrae.com, to be notified of its forthcoming release.
Find out more about Avanti Centrae on her website, www.avanticentrae.com, or follow her on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.
So interesting!! We do not live too far from a minimum security correctional facility and a maximum security state prison . . . the signs on the roads near them warning not to pick up hitchhikers always make me laugh, even though it is good advice.
Sounds like an exciting start to your book Avanti! Can't wait to read it!