The tale of Russell 'The Fox' Cox and the prison that never was

After nearly three decades as a prisoner and a fugitive on the run, bank robber and prison escapee Russell Cox (aka Melvile Peter Schnitzerling) will be released from prison and paroled back to Queensland this week. The media and Police Forces in three States dubbed him “Mad Dog” but he was neither mad or a “dog” (prison jargon for an informer). Men who did hard time with him at Grafton, Katingal, Jika Jika and H Division called him “The Fox”. It was a mark of respect for a man who still retained principles inside the world of maximum-security prisons: A dinosaur in today’s unprincipled world of criminality.

My first recollection of “The Fox” was at the Central Industrial Prison (CIP) at Long Bay State Penitentiary on Friday August 8, 1975 when I heard gunshots about 2.30pm. Gunshots are not a daily occurrence inside prison. When the tower screws started shooting onto the road outside the walls I knew there was an escape in progress.

Three prisoners, Allan McDougall, Marko Motric and Russell “The Fox” Cox, all serving time for armed robbery, had made a break from Long Bay’s Metropolitan Remand Prison. A 0.25 calibre Beretta had been smuggled into the jail and the trio had trailed a delivery truck into the caged section of the front gate area before using the pistol to overpower the prison guards on duty.

Prison Officer Paul Cafe was dragged from the truck and taken hostage while the gate-keeper, PO Sam Pavich, was forced at gunpoint to open the weapons cabinet. McDougall grabbed two Smith & Wesson 0.38’s from the cabinet while Motric and Cox positioned Cafe on the bonnet of the truck as a human shield that prevented warders shooting at the vehicle. Cox drove the truck to short-lived freedom while shots were exchanged with the tower screws.

The trio proceeded to a boom gate leading onto Anzac Parade under the protection of their human shield but the truck was rammed by a bread van. Another exchange of gunfire blew the tyres out. The three prisoners abandoned the truck and proceeded on foot still using Cafe as a shield. Another exchange of gunfire resulted in Cafe, Motric and Cox being wounded. The prisoners were overpowered, handcuffed and dragged into the secluded Observation Section of the CIP while Cafe was rushed to Prince Henry Hospital for treatment.

Both prisoners were bleeding profusely from their gunshot wounds when warders dumped them naked onto the floor of the OBS cells and left them there to die. Motric had a bullet wound to the head and both men were in shock. An ultimatum was relayed to prison medical staff. If Cox and Motric did not receive immediate medical treatment the jail population would blow up. It was a tense situation inside the CIP the next morning as the prospect of a full-scale riot increased.

The impasse ended about 2pm when prison authorities reluctantly allowed Nursing Sister Crowley and Dr Tony Graham into the OBS to treat the two injured prisoners. Dr Graham ordered immediate surgery for both men and insisted on their removal from the OBS cells.

At 5pm, 26-hours after they had both been shot, Cox and Motric, were transferred to Prince Henry Hospital for urgent surgery and the prospect of one of the bloodiest prison riots at Long Bay State Penitentiary had been averted.

Shortly after the August shoot-out I was transferred back to Grafton where the rehabilitation therapy of “reception biffs” and baton whippings occupied my jail time. “The Fox” and Motric were transferred up there shortly afterwards.

The Spring of ‘75 gave birth to a rumour that Grafton Jail, the Alcatraz of the NSW prison system, would be discontinued as a punishment jail. The floggings and brutality inflicted with impunity upon “intractables” by Grafton prison guards since 1943 abruptly ended. A high-tech multi-million dollar escape-proof punishment block built inside Long Bay Jail replaced Grafton. It was called Katingal Special Security Unit. I became the third intractable transferred from Grafton into the new incarceration process.

Katingal was a sterile, windowless, concrete bunker. It housed 40 cells, segmented into 8 identical cellblocks that were colour-coded to minimise disorientation. Each was a self-contained unit with five cells, a shower cubicle and workshop-recreation area. The central control panels situated in the observation galleries between the cellblocks electronically operated everything. The observation galleries were separated from the cellblocks by steel security grilles.

The cells measured 84 square feet and permanent fixtures doubled as furniture. A stainless steel unit set into the wall served as a combination toilet and water fountain. The food hatch doubled as a table, and a large concrete slab served as the bed, complete with fireproof blankets and a mattress. Each cell was under continuous surveillance from an observation spy hole in the rear wall.

All light inside Katingal was artificial. Air was pumped in through large air conditioning ducts. The ventilation principle relied upon the introduction of air through a small gap under the cell door or through the food hatch. Waste air was sucked out through ventilation shafts built into the toilet. It was a theoretically sound principle but it failed in reality because the stale air did not exit and remained in the cells causing constant headaches and nausea.

The confined space and lack of ventilation and increased body heat created condensation that soaked through the foam mattresses and formed pools of water underneath. It gave new meaning to the water bed concept.

Dubbed “The Blockhouse” or “The Electronic Zoo” life inside Katingal was comparable to living inside a submarine or an atomic bomb shelter: Night and day blended into one intensely isolating vacuum.

The faint rays of natural sunlight that did manage to trickle into Katingal squeezed through a canopy of steel bars that rested over the two elevated exercise yards at the end of each cell-block complex. The exercise yards nestled inside high concrete walls that obscured any views of the outside world. Exercise periods were initially permitted for one hour per day but were gradually extended as more “intractables” were transferred into the building.

“The Fox” was transferred into Katingal during 1976. A mass escape from Maitland Jail during 1977 resulted in a fresh intake of escapees that included Ray Denning, Dick Lynott, Steve Shipley, Roy “The Red Rat” Pollitt, Terry Humphries, Freddy Owens and William “Billy the Kid” Sutton.

A concerted effort was made to get a hacksaw blade into Katingal so the Maitland escapers could cut their way out of a van taking them to court. A hacksaw blade wrapped in carbon paper foiled the metal detectors and was smuggled into Katingal. A portion of the hacksaw blade was given to “the Fox” who used it to cut through one of the bars over the exercise yard.

On November 4, 1977 Cox asked the duty screw if he could retrieve his shoes from the exercise yard. In the exercise yard Cox jammed a paddle tennis bat into the crevice of the wall and shimmied up to the cut bar. He pulled it down and squeezed through the caged ceiling of the exercise yard and climbed down off the roof. He was spotted as he scaled the couple of 4.5 metre barbed wire topped perimeter fences that surrounded Katingal, but it was too late. “The Fox” had made the break: He had escaped from the escape-proof Katingal.

The underworld connections of an old boy network from inside Katingal enabled Cox to make his way to Melbourne following the escape. In July 1978 he left Australia and travelled to England where he worked as a seaman. In 1980 “The Fox” traveled to Germany and remained there until 1982 before returning to Australia. He settled in Victoria and began work as a builder’s labourer.

On July 14, 1988 ex-Katingal “trac” Raymond John Denning escaped from Goulburn Correctional Centre. Shortly after the escape Denning established contact with the old boy network from his Katingal days.

In 8 days Denning was able to accomplish what the combined efforts of the Queensland, Victorian and NSW Police Forces had failed to do in 10 years, 8 months and 19 days. On July 22, 1988 Denning established contact with Australia’s most wanted fugitive Russell “The Fox” Cox. The reunion was short-lived. Both men were recaptured after a shootout with Victorian Police at the Doncaster shopping centre. Also caught up in the swoop was Denning’s girlfriend, Ann Denton.

Six months after their recapture Denning rolled over and became a “supergrass” for the NSW Police department. He was rewarded with immunity from prosecution for all crimes he had committed. The deal also included an indemnity from the then Queensland Attorney-General, Dean Wells, for a bank robbery he had committed at Zillmere prior to linking up with Cox.

In return for the unlimited immunities and indemnities Denning decimated the secretive old boy network by revealing its existence to law enforcement agencies. The clandestine network spawned inside Katingal during 1975 was finally destroyed from within its own ranks. Denning was rewarded for his treachery and released from prison after serving 19 years. He died shortly afterwards from a heroin overdose.

Cox eventually faced trial at Sydney District Court for the 1977 Katingal escape. In a final twist of fate the trial judge directed the jury to acquit Cox because the Crown was unable to prove that he had been lawfully in custody at the time of the escape. Although Katingal Special Security Unit had been closed by the NSW Government seven months after his escape it had never been gazetted as a prison. There had never been any lawful warrant for the transfer of any prisoner into the building during its existence.

Katingal was the prison that never was. A prison that Russell “The Fox” Cox successfully escaped from 27 years ago.

As Cox prepares for his re-entry into a world he left nearly three decades ago the memories of places like Grafton, Katingal, Jika Jika and H Divison will slowly fade into obscurity for the man they call “The Fox”. He survived prison but now he must grapple with the complexities of a new world they call freedom.