Ty Conn
Tyrone Williams "Ty" Conn, born Ernest Bruce Hayes, was a Canadian bank robber. He was the only person in the last half-century to escape over the wall from the Kingston Penitentiary, one of Canada's most secure prisons.
History
Tyrone Conn was born in 1967, as Ernest Bruce Hayes, to an Ontario 15-year-old mother and a father from Newfoundland and Labrador. Soon after his birth, his mother abandoned him to the care of his father, who in turn abandoned him to the care of his maternal grandparents. They placed him for adoption at the age of three.He was adopted by a Belleville, Ontario psychiatrist, Dr. E. Bert Conn, and his wife. Dr. Conn's wife was described as mentally unstable. Tyrone Conn remained with Dr. Conn and his wife for eight years before being returned to the care of the local Children's Aid Society.
He then spent the balance of his adolescent and teenage years in foster homes, group homes, and youth detention facilities, starting at the Brookside Training School, at the age of fourteen.
During his time with his adoptive parents, Conn had developed a habit of compulsive stealing, starting with food and escalating, by his teens, to cars. From the age of thirteen to his death, nineteen years later, Conn was only "legally at large" for a total of sixty-nine days. Conn had also been "illegally at large" by escaping from a number of lower-security institutions.
In 1998, Conn was transferred to Kingston Penitentiary for acting as an informant at the Millhaven Institution. He advised security staff at Millhaven that fellow inmates were planning an escape and was therefore placed in protective custody.
Conn's escape on May 6, 1999, from inside the compound was the 26th in the history of facility. More than 50 escapees were involved in those 26 incidents. Conn employed a ladder and homemade grappling hook to scale the wall and used cayenne pepper to prevent dogs from following his scent.