Six Death Row Inmates Orchestrated A Prison Break 39 Years Ago
The inescapable Mecklenburg Correctional Center
Back 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…
