Unicor

Part three

And just like that, McNair was gone; transferred, to where I didn't know. 

A couple years later the guards came and grabbed my cellie, Richard, never a good thing. Remember, McNair and him were friends. But neither he nor I factored that into the equation of him being taken to the offices. It was a mystery.

He was gone for a while and then returned to the cell. This is the story he told.

McNair had escaped from the prison @ Pollock, Louisiana. 

Story told was, he had gotten a job at the Unicor factory ( they made clothing for the military ). And, that he had embedded himself inside a pile of clothing that had been sown and stacked onto a pallet to be shipped out. As per their procedure, this finished pallet of clothing, had been, at the end of the day, shipped outside the prison to await pickup by the client. Point is: McNair, hidden in this pallet, was suddenly outside the prison walls where he simply escaped the pallet of clothing, and walked away. Funny story: if you look this case up you will see on a cop video that as he was walking down a railroad track, just hours later, a local police officer spotted him and questioned him ... but let him go. Such is the skill of McNair as a first class bull-shitter.

Years went by and then once again my cellie was called to the office by staff. This time however, they brought him over to gloat on the fact that McNair had been captured; in Canada. You see, McNair had become a folk hero to the other prisoners who admired the fact that he had broken out of a Federal Prison. To illustrate this point I will add, that in 2012, the very famous and close friend of mine named, Gene Gotti, yeah, that Gene Gotti, bragged to me about knowing him before he escaped. 

Now, you can watch the story on TV and get THE official version of how McNair was captured, but I will here and now tell you the real story.

McNair had escaped across the border into Canada and set up a pretty good life for himself. In the process of building a new life he purchased a car, had a job and probably had a girl or two; he was a handsome man ... WHAT! hell no, I wasn't checking him out! What the hell's wrong with you! Jeez, you guys need to quit watching prison movies :)

Anyway, what happened is this: One afternoon McNair was in his car, in line to cross the border into the U.S. when to his chagrin he suddenly realized that there were cops doin a car-to-car search in front of him, typical border stuff MAYBE. McNair, being smart as hell evaluated his circumstances and made a blunt decision. Not knowing who or why they were searching cars, he put his own car in park, opened the door, and simply walked away, leaving his car idling in the long line.

Of course McNair realized that his abandoned car would be fingerprinted and the car and tied it to him. But, that was one of those unavoidable circumstances. What he didn't realize was that he had left a camera in the trunk, with photos he had taken. The cops processed the film, narrowed in on the scenery in the photos and from this had a pretty good idea of where he was staying. That's the part you won't hear. Once they got an idea of where to find him, they put all the local cops on notice. Sure enough, soon after, a local cop pulled him over and arrested him.

True story.

But being the inquisitive type, not to mention, nosey as hell, you are now wanting to know how all this ties into MY job at UNICOR, all these years later. Well, here it is: Remember in an earlier posting I told you about all of the obstacles that we had to overcome in order to get our product out and to the warehouse outside the fences; the lockdowns and so forth. Well, one of the biggest obstacles is that when we load a pallet with product onto a truck, that truck CANNOT leave the prison yard for 24 hours. Why you ask? Well, in prison we have mandatory times where we are be physically counted. Those times are, 12 midnight, 3am, 5am, 9am, 2pm, 4pm and 9pm. Pretty extensive.

So, how did McNair impact my job at UNICOR, well, as I told you, he hid in a pallet of clothing that was taken directly outside the walls and fences and set in storage for pickup. Had this pallet been required to SIT INSIDE the fences for 24 hours they would have realized, at one of those mandatory counts, that someone was missing and eventually determined who it was and checked his daily movement and found him hiding. Case closed. So, from that day forward ALL things leaving a prison yard must sit for 24 hours to verify that all of the prisoners are accounted for. 

And that my friend is my little story. 

Peace be with you. mark

 

Bruceton Mills, 9/17/2025