Jailed knife thug on run Con flees from hospital

A MANHUNT has been launched after a violent prisoner escaped from custody while being treated in hospital.

Michael Power, 22, absconded from St James’s Hospital in Dublin at around 10am yesterday.

Sources said he was seen running out of the A&E before running up James’s Street as four prison officers gave chase. Last night he was still on the loose.

An Irish Prison Service spokesman told the Irish Mirror: “We can confirm a prisoner has escaped from lawful custody while on escort to St James’s Hospital.

“An Garda Siochana were notified immediately and provided with all the relevant information in relation to the prisoner.

“The Irish Prison Service is currently investigating the circumstances of the escape.” The vicious thug, from Parslickstown Gardens in Mulhuddart, West Dublin, is serving an eight-and-a-half year sentence in Mountjoy for a cowardly attack on a homeless person in the city centre four years ago.

Power, who has a string of previous convictions, stabbed the man and then sliced his face with a knife, leaving him with a permanent scar.

The victim also had to have his spleen removed and is on life-long medication since the attack.

During Power’s trial in October 2017 it was noted he had a serious drug problem but was since clean and had become a facilitator in the prison’s alternative to violence programme.