12 Facts About Clarence Carnes

Clarence Carnes was born in Daisy, Oklahoma, the oldest of five children.

Clarence Carnes was raised in poverty, and his criminal activities began as a child, stealing candy bars from his school.

Clarence Carnes was sentenced to life imprisonment at the age of 16 for the murder of a garage attendant during an attempted hold-up.

Clarence Carnes was then sent to Leavenworth, but attempted to escape while in the custody of the United States Marshals Service and was transferred to Alcatraz along with an additional five-year sentence.

Shockley and Thompson were sentenced to death, however Clarence Carnes was not executed because he had not directly participated in the murders of the officers and was instead given a life sentence.

Clarence Carnes remained on Alcatraz until its closure in 1963, spending most of the time there in the segregation unit.

Clarence Carnes claimed that he had received a postcard from Frank Morris and the Anglin brothers, John and Clarence, which read "Gone fishing", which was a code word that their escape had succeeded.

Clarence Carnes died of AIDS-related complications on October 3,1988, at the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri, and was buried in a paupers' grave.

Bulger reportedly bought a lavish $4,000 bronze casket and paid for a car to transport Clarence Carnes' remains from Missouri to Oklahoma.

Clarence Carnes is buried at the Billy Cemetery in Daisy, Oklahoma.

Clarence Carnes' life was dramatized in the 1980 Telepictures Corporation TV movie Alcatraz: The Whole Shocking Story.

Clarence Carnes' life was interpreted in Rolling Way the Rock, a performance piece by Tim Tingle, a Choctaw man, which premiered in 2006 at the International Symposium of Artists of Conscience in Victoria, British Columbia.