FOLSOM, Jan. 30 – Folsom Prison had its share of incidents this past week — a suicide, an escape, and an escape attempt.

Friday night, guards in the security housing unit discovered the body of an inmate sitting on the floor of his cell, one end of a piece of cloth around his neck, the other tied to a towel rack.

Reportedly, Joseph Timothy Wynn, 41, placed a knot in the cloth at the front of his throat, so that the pressure of sitting on the floor would shut off the air supply. The guards had passed Wynn’s cell just moments before on their regular rounds, at which time he was sitting on his bunk. On the return check they found him dead.

Wynn came to the prison August 16, 1973 from Sutter County to serve six to 14 months for conspiracy to commit forgery. It was his third prison term.

No note was found and prison officials could not offer any reason for the suicide.

Guards in the prison’s minimum security ranch dormitory discovered inmate Terry Hunt, 29, missing at Saturday night’s check. Apparently, Hunt had walked away from the dorm sometime earlier in the day.

According to Associate Warden Robert Thomas, Hunt, serving his second term, had been convicted of burglary and car theft in Sacramento County. Tuesday, he was still at large.

Then, early yesterday morning, two corrections officers foiled another escape from the security housing unit.

At 12:55 a.m., Tuesday, Sergeant C.D. Reed and Officer Frank Spoon on their rounds discovered inmate Wendell Warren Norris, 28, on a tier outside the cell area attempting to cut through the metal security sash around a window leading to the outside of the unit. When he saw them approaching he handed whatever tool he was using to an inmate in a nearby cell and it was never located.

A subsequent search of the unit turned up a nine by 18 inch hole in the bars of Norris’ cell, another hole in the one-quarter inch security screen separating the outside tier from the cells and a hole of the same dimensions in the bars of the cell of Kenneth Daniel Como, 34, who was still in his cell.

According to Administrative Assistant Max Price, both men have a history or prison terms and are practiced escape artists.

Norris, who came under the supervision of the State Department of Corrections in 1970, escaped from the minimum security California Correctional Institution at Tehachapi in 1971. He is serving a term of five years to life for burglary, six to 14 months for credit card forgery, and six to 10 months for possession of dangerous drugs.

Como, whose extensive list of offenses, including assault with a deadly weapon, have resulted in sentences amounting to a minimum of 20 years, escaped from the Los Angeles County Jail in October, 1971. In that escape Como lowered himself eight floors down a crude handmade rope to the street below and escaped in a van driven by Sandra Good, a former member of the Charles Manson clan.

Apprehended shortly thereafter, he received a six month to five year sentence for escape and Ms. Good was charged with aiding in the escape.

Come, now serving his fifth term, made his first attempt to leave Folsom Prsion last June in exactly the same manner as Tuesday’s try.

Price said, “These men are no amateurs, they’re trying to get away from us.”