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Six Death Row Inmates Orchestrated A Prison Break 39 Years Ago

The inescapable Mecklenburg Correctional Center

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Briley brothers (two of the inmates involved in the escape) — image from richmond.com

BBack in 1982, fear started spreading like wildfire at the Mecklenburg Correctional Center in Virginia. One of the most notorious prisoners on death row, Frank Coppola, was executed via the electric chair. Coppola was convicted of beating a woman to death in a robbery. He stayed on death row for five years, and afterward, he asked the court for execution.

Everything went wrong with the process.

He caught on fire during the procedure. The eyewitnesses were more than keen to spread the word on how one of the toughest prison inmates died a painful death. But, Coppola secured the title of a martyr among the prison inmates.

The execution of Coppola sent fears among the other prison inmates that the state would embark on a series of executions going forward. The man that the other death row inmates looked up to was the first one to be executed. Hence, this was an eye-opener to them that the same fate could befall any one of them earlier than expected.

And before long, another rumor of a deadly bomb that was being cooked up by the prisoners surfaced. The prison carried out a thorough search as the chances of ignoring such a rumor could end up jeopardizing a lot of people’s lives. In the end, they found nothing. It seemed the prisoners did a very good job covering up their tracks for any traces. Or did they?

The double-gated entrance was the only way in. And there was no other way out. Two years after Coppola’s execution, Around 10 pm, officer Ron Sawyer was informed that a bomb was found in C-pod and ordered to drive a van to the prison front so that the bomb unit could dispose of the bomb at once. Prison policy didn’t allow both the prison gates to be opened at the same time. But, this was a very critical emergency that called for a bend in the policy.

The bomb unit members rushed out of prison, dressed up in protective gear. The bomb was already smoking, and one of the crew sprayed it with a fire extinguisher to cool down. The bomb successfully got out of the prison gates. But a more dire crisis awaited the prison.

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Lioness Rue
Lioness Rue

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