By Mike Simmons
On Tuesday, April 11, 1961, Florida State Trooper Bill McDaniel was patrolling along U.S. Highway 90 near Boy Scout Road in Walton County when he noticed a green and white Dodge weaving down the road about 1:30 PM. He turned on his blue light and pulled the car over (https://www.newspapers.com/image/264080053/?terms=%22Adrill%20Strickland%22).
When Trooper McDaniel asked the driver for his license, he couldn’t produce one. McDaniel got both of the men out of the car and searched them. He pulled out his handcuffs and began to cuff the driver. That is when he saw the passenger bring up a pistol and aim it at him.
With lightning-fast reflexes, McDaniel pushed the driver into the passenger and dove for a ditch on the side of the road. The bullet struck him in the shoulder. A second shot, this time from a rifle, was fired at him the next second, but missed. The gunman walked to McDaniel’s patrol car and shot the radio and gas tank. The men jumped back into their car and fled the scene.
Trooper McDaniel limped his car into the closest town, DeFuniak Springs, dripping gasoline all the way. He notified his headquarters, which sent all available units to him. Within an hour after the initial stop, the green and white Dodge was located abandoned near Buffalo Lake off U.S. Highway 331, about 2 miles north of U.S. 90. A 30-30 rifle was found inside.
By 7:00 PM, about 100 law enforcement officers and volunteers from all over the Florida panhandle had arrived to begin a search. A check with the FBI revealed that the car had been stolen from Mississippi by two brothers, Adrill and Quitman Strickland. They were said to be armed, dangerous and “experienced woodmen.” When the police bloodhounds from the nearby prison arrived, they tracked the suspects from the green and white Dodge north for about a mile but lost them. Soon, a police helicopter was on scene and dropped smoke in the woods to flush out the criminals. Additional bloodhounds were brought in from as far away as Alabama and even Panama City, Florida to resume the search the next morning.
At first light on Wednesday morning, April 12, the massive manhunt began again. Besides officers, volunteers, K-9s, and a helicopter, an airplane had been brought in to assist. Around 10:30 AM, the hoodlums were spotted near Juniper Lake, about a mile east of the abandoned car. That is when the gunfight started. However, this time, the bad guys lost, thanks to the sharpshooting skills of one of Walton County’s finest.
Adrill was shot in the hip. Not life-threatening, but it took the fight out of him. A week later, he was sitting in the infamous federal prison in Atlanta for a federal parole violation and Quitman was charged with impersonating a federal officer and aiding a federal prisoner to escape. He was in the U.S. Marshal’s custody in Savannah, Georgia.
An investigation into the background of the Strickland brothers found a surprise…Actually, several surprises.
Adrill Strickland was born on January 28, 1929, in East Point, Georgia, but the family moved to Florida when he was small. Being the eldest, Adrill’s brothers, Quitman and James, followed him everywhere, often into mischief. They looked – as brothers often do – all alike. Adrill must have had a real influence, because they continued to follow him into adulthood.
In 1953, Quitman was in the U.S. Marine Corps in Cherry Point, North Carolina when Adrill and James arrived in North Carolina driving a blue Mercury that had been stolen in South Carolina. It didn’t take long for Adrill to convince the others, picking up Quitman in New Bern, about 14 miles away. Quitman, now AWOL, was already a wanted man.
On August 28, 1953, Adrill, Quitman, and James arrived in Williamston, North Carolina. Adrill put James out with orders to steal a getaway car while he and Quitman committed a bank robbery at 9:30 AM. During the robbery of $17,348, they bragged that they formed a three-brother bandit team. Witnesses said that Adrill appeared to have planned the robbery, as he was the one giving orders. The two bandits fled the scene. They abandoned the blue mercury about five miles away.
James was the easy one. A stranger that looked like the robbers, asleep in a car that wasn’t his, was quickly picked up by the Williamston police. Quitman was arrested in the woods about 2:00 PM near where the Mercury was abandoned. Early the next morning, a farmer saw a “bedraggled youth” dart from the woods to a spot behind a church. He was carrying the bag used to put the bank money in. Highway Patrol Lt. Tom Brown and FBI Agent Art Lee responded and chased Adril down the road. Short chase – he was in custody a few minutes later. It seemed like the plan didn’t come together. As soon as Adrill’s wife, Betty, found out about his stunt, she filed for divorce.
Adrill was sentenced to 15 years in prison and Quitman to 10 years. James was found not guilty. So he went back home to Orlando and became a burglar. He was arrested in 1954 and sentenced to one year at the Orange County Prison Camp. On December 26, he slugged 65 year-old Corrections Officer Grover Canady, grabbed his .38 revolver, and fled. A couple of hours later though, he began to feel guilty, so he turned himself in.
The trio were quiet for six years – amazingly. Quitman and James had been released from prison and were free. Adrill had finally been paroled from the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, However, his stint in the slammer didn’t teach him how to behave. As soon as he got out, he stole a car in Jacksonville, but was caught in McIntosh County, Georgia. He now faced charges of transporting over the state line the vehicle he used.
He was taken to jail in Waycross. Early on April 3, 1961, an officer from Jacksonville, armed with a rifle brought in a handcuffed prisoner. The officer told the 69-year-old jailer, Josh Spence, that he needed to house the prisoner there for a few days. When Spence let him in, the prisoner threw off the cuffs and produced a handgun, while the “officer” pointed his gun at Spence. They freed Adrill and tied up Spence and Jailer Charles McClelland. Adrill and the other two – Quitman and James – fled the area. Ware County Sheriff Robert E. Lee (no kidding) set up roadblocks but found no trace of the hoodlums. They were headed to Walton County, Florida, for their meeting with Bill McDaniel.
Adrill Strickland was sent to the most famous prison of all time – Alcatraz. He died in 1966 and is buried in the Greenwood Cemetery in Apopka, Florida. Quitman died in 1997 and is buried in Harper Joy Assembly of God church cemetery in Dothan, Alabama. James died in 1999 in Jacksonville, Florida.
A long line of crimes perpetrated by three seriously dangerous felons ended in Walton County, Florida. Good work.