Dozens of inmates house in Rikers Island jail have launched ambitious attempts to escape the facility since it was built in 1932, but very few have done so without being recaptured.
1977: One of the most high-profile jail break attempts came in 1977 when 39 inmates simultaneously attempted to flee the jail.
Three of the 39 drowned in the attempted jail break and four successfully escaped.
1979: Two years later, on March 11, 1979, seven men launched a simultaneous escape from the House of Detention for Men on the island at 9pm.
Five of the men were apprehended shortly afterwards. Three of the inmates were found on the island and two were found in the east River, Ralph Gardner, a spokesman for the New York City Correction Department said at the time.
The two remaining inmates, 21-year-old Donald Brown who had been sentenced to three to six years for robbery, and Randy Starling, 27, convicted of possession of a weapon, a parole violation, remained at large for several more hours but failed to leave the island.
The two men were eventually spotted walking along Hazen Street, the main street of Rikers Island with coils of telephone wire draped over their shoulders, in a bid to disguise themselves as repairmen.
Dozens of inmates house in Rikers Island jail have launched ambitious attempts to escape the facility since it was built in 1932, but very few have done so without being recaptured.
Noticing the two men lacked an identification card that everyone on the island was required to wear at the time, two correctional officers questioned the men and took them to Rikers headquarters to finger print them.
Captured at 11am only yards away from the Men’s House of Detention from which they had broken out, the two prisoners said they had spent the night in bushes.
Investigators later found that the men had smashed their way through a pane of Plexiglas one‐quarter to one‐half‐inch thick, 20 feet above ground, which they reached by scaling a floor-to-ceiling gate, before swinging across to the window alongside it.
The 3‐by‐4‐foot plastic pane had apparently been weakened by repeated burning with lighted matches or paper, until it could be kicked out while guards were patrolling elsewhere.
2014: Four Rikers Island inmates tried to escape from their solitary cells by ripping a porcelain toilet out of the floor and smashing it through the cinderblock walls of five cells inside the jail, in March 2014.
Naquan Febres, one of the four masterminds behind the attempted breakout is pictured
Chris Martinez, Vernon Easley, Naquan Febres and Jeffrey Lashley reportedly crawled through the hole they made by throwing a toilet at a wall. In their attempt to escape, the men also attacked an officer with bricks.
The beleaguered officer ran off and called for backup, officials said at the time.
Department records stated that ‘the inmates entered the dayroom and refused to exit.’
Officers successfully thwarted the escape by convincing the inmates to return to different cells.
‘The officers and captain on post showed remarkable professionalism and restraint and no force was necessary to deal with this incident,’ an official said at the time.
The inmates reportedly caused $6,000 in damages during the escape.
2016 A mentally ill inmate escaped the correction facility by breaking open a fire exit with his body.
Gabriel Vazquez, 24, ran from the Anna M. Kross Center — the jail from which Hill attempted an escape — and darted to the roof.
Officers eventually apprehended him a short while after.
2017: Naquan Hill, 24, revealed how he improvised an escape from the island and took ‘advantage of the guards’ stupidity’ during his attempted breakout in July 2017.
Naquan Hill, 24, revealed how he improvised an escape from the island and took ‘advantage of the guards’ stupidity’ during his attempted breakout in July 2017.
Hill, who had been locked up on a burglary charge, aims his impulses got the better of him on July 26 when he scrambled up a 12-foot fence topped with razor wire, slicing his arms and stomach.
The inmate found a place to hide while a massive manhunt that included dogs, helicopters and boats sent the island into lockdown.
Hill remained in his hiding place for nearly eight hours, watching officers scour the island as he waited for the perfect opportunity to attempt to swim to freedom.
As he finally tried to make a break for the water, he was spotted by a pair of correction officers and tackled to the ground.
Escapes during which an inmate successfully escapes from the island are rare
Escapes during which an inmate successfully escapes from the island are rare.
Each facility on Rikers Island is surrounded by lofty walls and razor wire, and electric gates are guarded by security.
Mark Cranston, a former Correction Department commissioner who spent 25 years working at Rikers, told the New York times he remembered very few instances during his tenure when inmates successfully escaped from the island.
However one inmate, he said, escaped by clinging to the bottom of the bus that left the island, while another escaped by hiding in a garbage truck.
Rikers deploys special operation units during a red alert that include Bloodhounds, Cranston said. During a red alert, officers secure the perimeter to ensure all inmates remain on the premises.
According to Cranston, ‘A red alert is a rarity, and it happens when you have the high likelihood of an escape.’