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Escapes from Clinton were a fact of life for the prison’s first eighty-five years. During the 2015 breakout and subsequent manhunt, Governor Andrew Cuomo repeated the long-held belief that no one had ever escaped from Clinton. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Aside from the many individuals who walked away from work crews or fled the prison hospital, a number of truly hardened criminals have escaped from Clinton in the past. Several have gone over the wall, some have gone under, and others died trying. The fifth chapter of Escape from Dannemora discusses the role escapes have played throughout Clinton’s history, and details some of the more daring escape attempts.
