A notorious gangster is on the run after escaping by helicopter from a prison in the Paris region. Redoine Faid was helped by three heavily-armed men with assault rifles.
Two gunmen in balaclavas used smoke bombs and angle-grinders to break into the visitors' room where Faid was talking to his brother. A third man in the prison courtyard guarded the helicopter and its pilot - a flying instructor whom the men had taken hostage.
The helicopter flew to the nearby Gonesse area, where it was found by local police.
Faid, 46, has been serving a 25-year sentence for a failed robbery during which a police officer was killed.
This is the armed robber's second prison break: in 2013, he escaped after seizing four guards as human shields and blowing several doors off with dynamite.He staged that escape less than half an hour after arriving at a prison in northern France, and spent six weeks on the run.
Nearly 3,000 French police have been drafted into the manhunt, a police source told AFP. "Everything is being done to locate the fugitive," an interior ministry official said.
Source : BBC
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