Sentence to life: Pep The Cat-Murdering Dog

Eastern State Penitentiary was famous not only for being a massive, expensive structure that pledged to rehabilitate lawbreakers through “confinement in solitude with labor,” it was famous for the criminals it held within its walls.

Al Capone, Willie Sutton and Pep the Cat-Murdering Dog were among its more notorious inmates.

In 1924, Eastern State saw what must have been the most unusual inmate ever incarcerated in the penitentiary during the entire history of the institution. According to prison lore, Pennsylvania Governor Gifford Pinchot allegedly sentenced Pep “The Cat-Murdering Dog” to a life sentence at Eastern State in August of that year. Pep allegedly murdered the governor’s wife’s cherished cat. Prison records reflect that Pep was assigned an inmate number (no. C2559), which is seen in his mug shot at left. However, the reason for Pep’s incarceration remains a subject of some debate. A newspaper article reported that the governor donated his own dog to the prison to increase inmate morale and the story of the “cat murder” was concocted as a humorous publicity story.

The prison was closed down in 1970, its electrical and mechanical systems a shambles.

I am looking for a roommate! Bweheheh!!!

The huge stone hulk, with its solitary-confinement cells and thirty-foot-high walls, is allegedly teeming with caged spirits who are after many years waiting to get out.

Watching over these imprisoned spirits is the apparition of a guard, who has been seen in the prison’s high guard tower late at night.

Cell that has been restored.

This is Al Capone cell restored as well - That is the perks of being a mob boss hehehe, you get all this $h1t.

A collection of antique jars? Teheheheh.

This is the end of cellblock 10.