Great escape

Notorious French criminal makes dramatic jail break where heavily armed men in a helicopter take him to freedom.

RAU ( France): French police across the country have launched a massive manhunt for a notorious gangster who said his life of crime was inspired by Hollywood films like Scarface, after he pulled off a spectacular jailbreak, fleeing his prison aboard a hijacked helicopter in a commando-style operation.

Redoine Faid (pic), 46, broke out of the prison near Paris with the help of two accomplices who used smoke bombs and angle grinders to make their way into the facility’s visiting room where Faid was talking to a brother, who was later taken into custody, according to prison unionist Martial Delabroye and a judicial source.

The men quickly made good their escape in the helicopter in an opera- tion lasting just 10 minutes, Delabroye said at the penitentiary in Reau in the French capital’s southeastern suburbs.

It was the second time Faid had pulled off a spectacular escape. In 2013, he blasted his way out of a prison in northern France using dynamite.

Some “2,900 police and gendarmes have been mobilised” for a nationwide manhunt, a police source said.

The helicopter – hijacked from a terrified flight instructor -– landed at around 11.15am in the prison yard.

The two black-clad men, armed with assault rifles, set off smoke bombs before breaking their way into the prison’s visitation room using the power tools.

The wardens, who were unarmed, fled to safety and raised the alarm.

The helicopter was later found in a northeastern suburb of Paris about 60km from the prison, one source said.

A police source said the helicopter pilot was a flight instructor waiting for a student when he was seized by Faid’s accomplices. He was forced to fly before being freed later in a state of shock.

The men apparently went on to use a car that was later found torched in a shopping mall carpark, police said.

French Justice Minister Nicole Belloubet, who arrived at the prison in Reau on Sunday evening, said the commandos most likely “used drones to survey the location ... the inquiry that’s under way will tell us”.

The escape came after an appeals court in April sentenced Faid to 25 years for masterminding a botched armed robbery in 2010 in which a policeman was killed.

Faid has been behind bars since mid-2011 for breaking the terms of his parole over past convictions for bank robberies and brazen heists of cash-in-transit vehicles.

During his 2013 jailbreak, he briefly took four guards hostage with a pistol before escaping in a waiting getaway car. All the hostages were released unharmed.

Faid was recaptured six weeks later at a hotel in an industrial area on the outskirts of Paris.

A woman working at the hotel said at the time that Faid’s accomplice had paid for the room in cash and that the two men had been there for several days.

Faid had earlier been released from a 10-year stint behind bars after convincing parole officers that he regretted his criminal past and was determined to start afresh.