Breakout: Escape from Jika Jika

Описание: A look at the July 1983 escape from HMP Pentridge’s ‘escape-proof’ Jika Jika facility.



Striking out in a new direction here, though I did manage to get Victorian politics involved a little. I came upon this story when I read a one sentence explanation in the Wikipedia entry for Pentridge: “In 1983 four prisoners escaped from 'escape-proof' Jika Jika”. The lack of detail intrigued me. A $7 million facility escaped from, and just a fleeting mention? My investigation led me down a rabbit hole of newspaper articles, books about Pentridge, punitive justice practices of the 19th and 20th centuries and the methods employed to escape them. I currently have an FOI request for details about the investigation of the escape awaiting processing from Victoria Police, but their wait time is at 35 weeks currently, so I will update this if I do end up receiving something. I am also awaiting access to a news report on the escape from the National Film and Sound Archive.

Update 12/04/25: The NSFA request was only available for me to view in person, rather than reproduce for the consideration of others. Victoria Police got back to me with the completed FOI, and generously waived the fee due to the delay in processing the FOI'ed documents. Unfortunately, the documents were from the investigation into the April 1983 escape from a different division, rather than the July escape from Jika Jika.

Chopper Read (a fine storyteller but pathological liar) spoke about the Jika Jika fire here (25:40):
   • Видео  

References:
Pentridge - Behind the Bluestone Walls by Don Osborne
PENTRIDGE - Voices from the other side by Rupert Mann
Jailbreak: Australia's Most Unforgettable Prison Escapes by Wendy Lewis
Various newspaper articles from the Age, Herald Sun and Canberra Times.
Pauline Toner’s account comes from Victorian Legislative Assembly Hansard, August 9, 1983.
Quotations from the interim report on the Select Committee upon the Victorian Prisons Service are taken from Minutes of the Proceedings, Volume 6 for the 49th Parliament of Victoria, page 218.
“Pentridge” performed by Kevin Shegog

Footnotes:
1: Pentridge was originally established as a base for prisoners to work on the construction of Pentridge Road, now known as Sydney Road.
2: Around $36 million in today’s money.
3: Rupert Mann wrote that: “The area inside the fence had…microwave technology with a ‘Stellar screen energy field’, whatever that was”. No clue where he got this from.
4: He also had “a telescope, a horse, a ghost and a parrot on his left arm, and a spider, three snakes and a cobweb on his right arm”.
5: I found out too late to add it in, but McGauley’s middle name was McClure.
6: Often alternatively spelt Youlton in various sources. He had spider webs tattooed on his elbows.
7: The “instruments of torture” according to Osborne.
8: Alright, look. I don’t want to glamourise criminality. These guys were terrible, Wright especially, but the image of four men in shorts and t-shirts in single-digit temperature, probably spattered with their own blood, leaping out of an inescapable unit of a high-security prison and running out into the night is awesome.
9: Lacquer is nominated as another possible source of the fumes by Wendy Lewis in Jailbreak, and also specifies that Jolly was working on a pair of moccasins.
10: Lewis suggests it was constructed of the frame of the notice board, rather than the notice board itself, which seems more plausible.
11: According to Lewis, police had “gone through 450 hot meals and 20 dozen pies”. No source (nor sauce) is provided for this statistic, but it sounds reasonable.
12: Neville and Youlten were only armed robbers.
13: Witnesses who had testified against Wright were placed under police guard immediately following his escape.
14: Another flat was also raided in Footscray in connection to the robbery, where further evidence was found.
15: The minister also noted that “the recent arrest of a person employed at Pentridge has resulted in significantly reduced drug activity by prisoners”.
16: Kennan (at one point misspelt as “Kerman” by the Age) was referred to as the Minister for Corrections by the article, despite such a ministry not existing at that time. Kennan was Attorney-General which managed Corrections. Also:

If you think I'm kiddin', ask Jim Kennan
Who retreated into his kennel
When he got in the path of Ches Baragwanath
State Auditor-General