He is best known for being part of an attempted escape from Alcatraz Penitentiary in 1938, and for attacking Al Capone in the prison's laundry room on June 23, 1936.

Lucas was originally sentenced to thirty years' imprisonment for robbing First National Bank in Albany, Texas,[1] and violation of the Dyer Act (interstate trafficking of stolen vehicles).

[citation needed] On June 23, 1936, Lucas stabbed Al Capone in the back with a pair of scissors from the prison barber shop.

Once the supervisor was rendered unconscious, the convicts would escape through a window to the rooftop, where they would incapacitate an armed guard and leave the island via a seized police boat.

They enacted their escape plan on May 23, 1938, in the prison's mat shop, where they assaulted Custodial Officer Royal Cline with hammer blows to his head.