The Dead Files blog

March, 2012 Archive

The Alcatraz Investigation

March 26, 2012, 10:38 PM  |  Comments (3)  |  Permalink

O.K. to be perfectly honest I was not really that excited to investigate Alcatraz. I have wanted to go there and do the tour, but never made it, as it was not a priority on any of the two previous trips to San Francisco. On one with my mom back in 2000, we just shopped, ate, spa’d and went on fantastic wine tours and drank!  Then one with Matt when we celebrated the wrap of the first season; we just went to the Muir Woods (OMG SO PRETTY!), Japantown and Japantown, LOL…our FAVORITE place in San Francisco.  Any day off, Matt & I went and ate at Japantown! We LOVE IT!

So, I was very happy to go back to San Francisco, but had to kind of get myself excited to do Alcatraz. I asked if I could sleep over, but I was not allowed. That was a bummer.

What did I know about The Rock? Well, that it is called The Rock, that it was a prison, and old one. That two men tried to escape and were eaten by sharks (horrifying!)

The Walk: TALK ABOUT COLD! Matt & I had to stand outside on the boat ride over for filming. I thought that we were going to freeze to death, so that is what I am thinking in those shots!

Arriving at the Island, the first thing I got was men and women partying.  Confusion sets in. This is a PRISION…WTF?

I walk and walk and walk and walk and there are SO many layers and layers and some dead, one in particular who at the time I felt I could have taken home with me; later on I would be horrified at myself for being so naïve.

The problem was: THIS IS A JAIL, JAIL, BARS, MEN were here, MEN, Bars, Violence, Black sheets covering up important information, cracks all over.  I became focused, obsessed with what it was, had been, is…I was seeking out information in any way I could, screaming at myself to just be and let it flow, instead of thinking to myself “Well of COURSE I am going to get that there were violent men here, and fights and blah, blah, blah!”

It was very frustrating and yet, it was interesting to see at the same time during the reveal that I got SO much, so clearly.  Now was that because I did not know much of anything about Alcatraz, so even though there were some distractions, it was not overwhelming me and I could still connect?

I guess we will all find that out at the next Special location, which I know about inside and out, because it has haunted me since I was a very little girl!

Posted By: Amy Allan

Alcatraz Special

March 26, 2012, 10:33 PM  |  Comments (0)  |  Permalink

All I can say is WOW! Alcatraz was something to see, I was also fortunate enough to have great access to most of the prison. I have been to many prisons across the country to interview inmates in the process of conducting an investigation. Alcatraz was a unique prison to say the least. The island itself was incredible to see, it had an odd feeling of total isolation even though the mainland was so near. It was unlike any prison I have been to, due in most part to the size of it and the fact that it was on an Island. The jail blocks that housed the prisoners were much smaller than I had anticipated and after spending some time in the actual cells itself, I appreciated my bedroom at home a lot more…. Lol. The hole and the isolation block of the prison gave a real insight as to what these men went through while incarcerated. It’s a tourist attraction I would definitely suggest to friends and family to see, even though I’ve never even been to the Statue of Liberty myself and it’s practically in my backyard, go figure.

This was an investigation unlike anyone Amy & I had done before, it was a known location and even though I thought I knew a lot about Alcatraz, a lot of what I thought was true turned out to be false. I was lucky enough to have been able to interview not only two former guards that worked on the island, but, I was also able to interview a former inmate who spent five years on Alcatraz and who had spent 29 days in the hole at one point during his time there. My investigation led me to a lot of documentation and so much information that it was actually a little tough to digest it all. I actually had to break protocol with Amy and view footage of her walk to decipher what actually applied to what I was uncovering. Some of the witnesses I interviewed that had experiences in the prison when they were visiting the prison had life changing experiences. As it turns out, Amy was able to bring light to what was going on there and saw some pretty disturbing things that go along with prison life. I hope you enjoy this episode as much as I did conducting the investigation.

Posted By: Steve Di Schiavi

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