Most notorious prison system penitentiaries around america
Link Location Gps ← Find Best directions
Gps Coordinates / 37.9366723,-122.4892841
Prison Systems America Crime VR Address
Prison Systems America
WGP6+M78 San Quentin, California, USA
San Quentin State Prison
Opened in July 1852, San Quentin (called "The Arena" by prisoners) is the oldest prison in California. The state's only death row for male inmates, the largest in the United States, is located at the prison. It has a gas chamber, but since 1996, executions at the prison have been carried out by lethal injection, though the prison has not performed an execution since 2006. The prison has been featured on film, radio drama, video, podcast, and television, is the subject of many books, has hosted concerts, and has housed many notorious inmates.
Link Location Gps -122.4843579
Gps Coordinates / 37.9413723,-122.4843579
The death row at San Quentin is divided into three sections:- the quiet "North-Segregation" or "North-Seg," built in 1934, for prisoners who "don't cause trouble", the "East Block," a "crumbling, leaky maze of a place built in 1927", and the "Adjustment Center" for the "worst of the worst." Most of the prison's death row inmates reside in the East Block. The fourth floor of the North Block was the prison's first death row facility, but additional death row space opened after executions resumed in the U.S. in 1978. The adjustment center received solid doors, preventing "gunning-down" or attacking persons with bodily waste. As of 2016 it housed 81 death row inmates and four non-death row inmates. A dedicated psychiatric facility serves the prisoners. A converted shower bay in the East Block hosts religious services. Many prison programs available for most inmates are unavailable for death row inmates.
Link Location Gps / Link Gps -122.4859127 / Link Gps -122.4932963 / Link Gps -122.4847415
Gps Cordinates / 37.9382405,-122.4859127 / 37.937444,-122.4932963 / 37.9396334,-122.4847415
Folsom State Penitentiary
Link Location Gps -121.1613019
Gps Coordinates / 38.6921395,-121.1613019
Opened in 1880, Folsom is the state's second-oldest prison, after San Quentin, and the first in the United States to have electricity. Folsom was also one of the first maximum security prisons, and has been the execution location of 93 condemned prisoners.
Link Location Gps / Link Gps -121.1614081 / Link Gps -121.1618835 / Link Gps -121.1694742
Gps Cordinates / 38.691944,-121.1614081 / 38.6909926,-121.1618835 / 38.694166,-121.1694742
Construction of the facility began in 1857 on the site of the Stony Bar mining camp along the American River. The prison officially opened in 1880 with a capacity of 1,800 inmates. They spent most of their time in the dark, behind solid boiler plate doors in stone cells measuring 4 by 8 ft with 6-inch eye slots. Air holes were drilled into the cell doors in the 1940s, and the cell doors are still in use today.
FSP was the first prison in the world to have electric power, which was provided by the first hydroelectric powerhouse in California.
In 1920, three convicts hijacked a prison train that was used to move materials and smashed it through a prison gate to escape.
On June 16 1932 Dwight E. Abbott, 24, a Los Angeles robber, escaped from Folsom by making a lifelike dummy. The dummy was cleverly made to look real enough with Abbott's own hair, that of his cellmate, and a plaster of Paris face, to fool the guards until late the next day. This, according to the Warden, was seen in his bed and deceived the guards until general lock-up
Link Location Gps -121.1674517
Gps Coordinates / 38.689323,-121.1674517
Sept 1937 Approximately 40 inmates had been waiting to talk to Warden Clarence Larkin concerning upcoming parole hearings when seven of the inmates suddenly attacked him. As they took him into the yard, other guards started firing. In the commotion that followed, Officer Harry Martin and Warden Larkin were both stabbed to death. Officer Martin died at the scene, and Warden Larkin died of his wounds five days later.
Ohio State Prison Penitentiary
The Ohio State Reformatory (OSR), also known as the Mansfield Reformatory, is a historic prison located in Mansfield, Ohio in the United States. It was built between 1886 and 1910 and remained in operation until 1990, when a United States Federal Court ruling (the 'Boyd Consent Decree') ordered the facility to be closed. While this facility was used in a number of films (including several while the facility was still in operation), TV shows and music videos, it was made famous by the film The Shawshank Redemption (1994) when it was used for the majority of the movie.
Gps Coordinates / 40.7823252,-82.5010333
The history of the Ohio State Reformatory began in 1862, the field where the reformatory would be built was used as a training camp for Civil War soldiers. The camp's name had significant meaning to Ohio as it was name Camp Mordecai Bartley in honor of the Mansfield man who served as Ohio Chump in the 1840s.
Link Location Gps / Link Gps -82.5008403 / Link Gps -82.499827 / Link Gps -82.4989619
Gps Cordinates / 40.7825655,-82.5008403 / 40.7837554,-82.499827 / 40.7849614,-82.4989619
In 1867, Mansfield was promoted as a candidate for the placement of the new Intermediate Penitentiary (the original name before it was changed to Ohio State Reformatory). The city raised $10,000 to purchase 30 acres of land for the prison, and the state acquired 150 acres of adjoining land for $20,000, the cost of the facility was $1,326,769. The Intermediate (Ohio State Reformatory) was intended as just that, a halfway point between the Boys Industrial School in Lancaster and the State Penitentiary in Columbus which was intended to house young first-time offenders. Construction began in 1886 and remained under construction until 1910 due to funding problems which caused construction delays.
Link Location Gps / Link Gps -82.502481 / Link Gps -82.501695 / Link Gps -82.5015667
Gps Cordinates / 40.784215,-82.502481 / 40.7839717,-82.501695 / 40.7837867,-82.5015667
On September 15, 1896 the reformatory opened its doors to its first 150 offenders. These prisoners were brought by train from Columbus and put immediately to work on the prison sewer system and the 25-foot stone wall surrounding the complex. Schnitzer was presented with a silver double inkwell by the governor of the state in a lavish ceremony to thank him for his services. The exterior of the building, which is built from brick and concrete, is designed in the Romanesque style giving the frontage a castle-like appearance.
Link Location Gps / Link Gps -82.502895 / Link Gps -82.5029717 / Link Gps -82.5024633
Gps Cordinates / 40.7839283,-82.502895 / 40.783895,-82.5029717 / 40.78367,-82.5024633
The Reformatory remained in full operation until December 1990 when it was closed via federal court order. As the result of a prisoners' class action suit citing overcrowding and inhumane conditions. The District Court for the Northern District of Ohio ordered the prison closed by the end of December 1986. This order was known as the Boyd Consent Decree. The closing date was moved to 1990 due to delays in constructing the replacement facility, the Mansfield Correctional Institution, which stands to the west of the old prison.
Link Location Gps / Link Gps -82.50232 / Link Gps -82.502595 / Link Gps -82.5027517 / Link Gps -82.5026971
Gps Cordinates / 40.7836367,-82.50232 / 40.783745,-82.502595 / 40.7835988,-82.5027517 / 40.7837039,-82.5026971
Events and tours
The Ohio State Reformatory currently hosts several different events throughout the year, one of the most popular being the “INK”carceration Music & Tattoo Festival, which is a 3-day rock band show in mid-July. A few of the other events include The Shawshank Hustle a 7k running race that goes past 5 film locations of The Shawshank Redemption, Murder Mystery Dinner Theatre which is written and acted out by the Mansfield Playhouse, and the Pour One Nine Beerfest which features over 25 brews and wines as well as live artists and food.
Rikers Barge State Penitentiary
Rikers Islands barge under the nickname "The Boat", is an 800-bed jail barge used to hold inmates for the New York City Department of Corrections. The barge is anchored off the Bronx's southern shore, across from Rikers Island, near Hunts Point. It was built for $161 million at Avondale Shipyard in Louisiana, along the Mississippi River near New Orleans, and brought to New York in 1992 to reduce overcrowding in the island's land-bound buildings for a lower price. Nicknamed "The Boat" by prison staff and inmates, it is designed to handle inmates from medium- to maximum-security in 16 dormitories and 100 cells.
Gps Coordinates / 40.802232,-73.8739565
On February 1, 1957, Northeast Airlines Flight 823 crashed onto Rikers Island shortly after departing LaGuardia Airport, killing 20 and injuring 78 out of a total of 95 passengers and 6 crew. After the crash, department personnel and inmates ran to the site to help survivors. As a result of their actions, of the 57 inmates who assisted with the rescue effort, 30 were released and 16 received a sentence reduction of six months by the N.Y.C. Parole Board.
Sing Sing State Penitentiary
Sing Sing Correctional Facility is a maximum-security prison operated by the New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision in the village of Ossining, New York. It is about 30 miles north of New York City on the east bank of the Hudson River. Sing Sing holds about 1,700 prisoners and housed the execution chamber for the State of New York until the abolition of capital punishment in New York in 2004.
Gps Coordinates / 41.1531554,-73.868548
Link Location Gps / Link Gps -73.8710005 / Link Gps -73.867046 / Link Gps -73.8660985
Gps Cordinates / 41.1537132,-73.8710005 / 41.1492468,-73.867046 / 41.1508127,-73.8660985
In total, 614 men and women including four inmates under federal death sentences were executed by electric chair at Sing Sing until the abolition of the death penalty in 1972. After a series of escapes from death row, a new Death House was built in 1920 and began executions in 1922. High profile executions in Sing Sing's electric chair, nicknamed "Old Sparky", include Julius and Ethel Rosenberg on June 19, 1953, for espionage for the Soviet Union on nuclear weapon research and Gerhard Puff on August 12, 1954, for the murder of an FBI agent. The last person executed in New York state was Eddie Lee Mays, for murder, on August 15, 1963.
Gps Cordinates / 41.1532427,-73.8675525