This video was made possible by WIX. If you’re ready to create a website, head
over to wix.com/go/infographics2019 to try out one of their premium plans right now. “We go tonight,” is often the dramatic
movie line you hear in the prison escape epic, but in the case of escapes, fiction doesn’t
need to embellish hard facts. It’s some endeavor for the prisoner to break
out of a cell, go over a wall, dig tunnels under the ground, sometimes tie up a guard,
and for the criminal with some cash behind him, perhaps get a helicopter out of there. We’ve already told you about possibly the
only escape from the notorious prison of Alcatraz, of El Chapo’s escape tunnel, and we’ve
gone over some pretty terrible failed escapes, but what we have for you today we can say
are some the most ingenious prison escapes on record. 9. Explosive Fruit
In 1996 the New York Times reported that a man who had been serving an 18-year sentence
in France for armed robbery managed to escape from prison. This was a 34-year old called Michel Vaujour,
who had previously escaped from prison in France three times. This escape was said to be his most brazen,
worthy of a trophy if they were awarded for such criminal activity. It was reported that Vaujour flew away in
a helicopter with a woman, who it was later said was his wife and who had been taking
flying lessons in preparation for the escape. What the Times didn’t say was that to get
to the roof Vaujour had an ingenious ways of getting past guards. He was holding grenades and threatening to
throw them at anyone who got in his way. Except those grenades, according to CNN, were
nectarines that he had earlier painted to look like grenades. CNN said that he was later captured, but then
says he ended up doing another bank robbery only to be shot in the head and survive. We are not sure where he is right now, but
it seems he’s written a book and is a free man. 8. More Food Stuff
Prior to this 2015 escape no one had ever escaped from the maximum security Clinton
Correctional Facility in Dannemora, New York. At around 5 am guards discovered that two
men were missing from their cells, and they were the convicted murderers Richard Matt
and David Sweat. It was soon found out that these men had painstakingly
made a tunnel whose ending, called an external breach, was 500 feet (150 meters) outside
the prison walls. This would of course take some doing with
a spoon, but it’s said the men managed to get hold of tools from contractors inside
the prison. Those tunnels were partially already made,
but still a lot of digging, breaking and cutting had to be done. The New York Times said that the men first
had to cut through the cell, and for that they used a hacksaw. A prison tailor later admitted he’d been
smuggling in blades hidden inside frozen hamburger meat. The escape has been compared to the one in
the movie "The Shawshank Redemption,", but it ended badly after a massive man hunt resulted
in Matt being shot and killed by U.S. border patrol and Sweat being shot and then sent
back to prison. 7. Tight Fit
This is the story of a man nicknamed the Korean Houdini, and we very much doubt anyone will
ever repeat what he did to get out of prison. That’s because he didn’t require any fancy
tools, helicopters, or weapons, he just needed to lose a bit of weight and become more flexible. On the day of the escape in 2012 he covered
himself in a kind of gel and then proceeded to squeeze his body through a 15-centimeter-high,
45-centimeter-wide food slot. Take a moment please to imagine what that
must have looked like. The police at the detention center in Daegu
police station in Korea were rightly stumped. It was only when they looked at surveillance
footage that they saw the 165 cm (5 foot 4), 114 pound (52 kg) man slipping through the
small hole that they knew how he had gotten away. The man was said to be very flexible because
during the 23 years he had been incarcerated during his life he had practiced yoga and
become a master. He was recaptured anyway a few weeks later. The Korean authorities later told the press
that they had now given him a cell with a smaller food slot. 6. The Studious Serial Killer
There is no doubt you’ve all heard of Ted Bundy, perhaps one of the most demented and
violent serial killers in American history. What you might not know is that he escaped
from cells twice during his incarceration in the 1970s. The first time was perhaps the most ingenious,
with Bundy telling authorities he needed to study law as he was representing himself. He’d already studied law as a free man,
but during a court trial he said he needed to read up on something. He was given access to the library during
recess, and as he wasn’t wearing restraints because he was both lawyer and prisoner, he
went to that library unimpeded. He then jumped out of a second story window
and went on the run. He was recaptured but then when imprisoned
at a later date he used books again to escape. This time he simply got through the jailhouse
roof, and then left books under his blanket so guards would think it was him sleeping. According to Bundy, one of the more educated
serial killers we’ve seen, escaping was easy. This is what he said to a prison psychologist
on the telephone, “Over the months, I had noticed a number of opportunities to just
walk right out. I'd thought a great deal about escape, and
I didn't know if I had the guts to do it, quite frankly." 5. A Simple Plan
This next one might sound simple, but it took guts and you could say there was genius in
the simplicity. The escapee was called Charles Victor Thompson
and he had been sentenced to death for murdering his girlfriend in 1998. During his time behind bars he conceived a
simple plan, and that was to walk right out of prison. For this he first had to smuggle in ordinary
clothes, and in 2005 he arranged a meeting with his lawyer. Apparently at one point the lawyer left the
room and then Thompson got into his civilian clothes. He opened the door and started walking, and
then after that he said later he just walked anywhere he could find open doors until he
found himself next to a door that led to freedom. He didn’t last long on the outside, however,
and while he was sheltered and fed because he pretended to be a Hurricane Katrina evacuee,
the cops got him after he made a drunken phone call. He is now back in prison and has written a
couple of books. Oh, and to this day no one knows where he
got the handcuff key from and Thompson doesn’t want to tell. 4. The Escape Artist
Here we have a notorious British criminal with quite a brain, and that’s because not
only did he break out of prison three times but he learned law while inside and represented
himself. His name was Alfie Hinds, and he was to serve
a 12-year stint for armed robbery in the 1950s. During one of those escapes he’d gotten
fellow inmates to do some work on a toilet door, and that meant attaching metal screw
eyes to the door. When Hinds asked to go to the toilet he was
escorted by two officers, but then Hinds pushed the officers into the toilet and attached
a padlock he’d earlier smuggled in to the screw eyes. His freedom lasted all but five hours. Nonetheless, after escaping another two times
he was eventually given a pardon for his crimes because of his vast knowledge of the British
legal system. After that he acquired celebrity status in
the UK. 3. A Sticky Situation
The BBC reported in 2017 that a whole bunch of inmates had escaped from an Alabama prison
after tricking a guard with peanut butter. The article tells us that the inmates were
well aware that one of the guards was new and perhaps didn’t know his way around very
well. It’s said the prisoners used peanut butter
to cover up a number on an exit door. In a statement the sheriff’s office explained
exactly what happened. That statement read, “The inmates took advantage
of a new guard by using peanut butter to conceal an exit door number. When the inmates called for the guard to open
the door and let them in a cell, the guard inadvertently opened the exit door.” The BBC, having fun with this wrote, “It
was not clear which variety of the paste was used by the prisoners, or whether it was crunchy
or smooth.” The U.S. authorities did say the men were
clever, but they weren’t that clever because they were all rearrested shortly after tasting
freedom. 2. The Transvestite
The year was 2012, a year when a drug trafficker from Brazil decided he didn’t want to spent
any more time behind locked doors. His name is Ronaldo Silva, and during a visit
with his wife he just walked out of the prison. We are not sure what happened to the wife. What he had done was switch clothes with his
loved one while she was visiting him. He then put on some lipstick that she had
brought in, and also donned a woman’s wig and some high heels. Prior to this we should say that he had had
a very close shave. He apparently got out of the prison, but someone
later told police that a strange looking man not walking very well was hanging around a
bus stop. Police then arrested him. You can see the photos online of how he looked
dressed as a woman, and you might agree with us that it’s frankly amazing he got one
foot out of the visiting room. 1. Mass Escape From The Maze
This might be the biggest prison escape in history, but if not it’s certainly the biggest
in terms of numbers that the UK has ever seen. That’s because 35 prisoners got out. It was 1983 and this group all belonged to
the Irish Republican Army. They made it out of a prison in Belfast, Northern
Ireland, called Maze. We won’t call it too ingenious as it took
some amount of violence to escape, but 35 nonetheless is a big number when we consider
the facility was maximum security. With knives and smuggled guns the group of
inmates demanded that the officers they had hostage give them their clothes and car keys,
and that they did under duress. An alarm was raised and there was mayhem in
the prison, but with hostages it was a tricky situation. Later the inmates got hold of a food truck
and tried to drive it out of the gates, with some of the inmates dressed in officers uniforms
and so causing confusion. The officers blocked the gates with their
cars, and so the men got out and proceeded on foot. Officers were shot and stabbed during this
ordeal and one man died. Others were very seriously injured. 38 were in the escape gang, but three didn’t
make it out. It was called the biggest prison escape in
Europe since World War II. 15 men were recaptured the same day, and another
three soon after. What happened to the rest is a long story,
but some were killed, some were sent back to prison, and some were extradited from the
USA. Out of the 38 that tried to get out that day,
after many years only two men have evaded arrest or being killed. Not every plan in life has to be quite so
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