Paris thief flies out of prison in dramatic 10-minute escape
What's the story
Paris will be talking about July 1, 2018 for long, when it saw one of its most dramatic jailbreaks of all time: gunmen landed inside a prison in Réau in a helicopter and flew away with one of the country's most notorious thieves, an inmate there, in 10 minutes.
Even the justice minister lauded their feat!
3,000 policemen have now launched a manhunt for Redoine Faid.
Escape
Gunmen landed in a rare uncovered area of the prison
Jail officials could just watch in shock as the helicopter landed in the only area in the prison not protected by anti-aircraft netting.
Two gunmen then took out smoke bombs and angle grinders to make their way to the visiting room, where Faid was meeting his brother.
They escorted him to the chopper, where the pilot- a flying instructor taken hostage- was waiting, and took off.
Van
The men are now reportedly fleeing in a white van
The criminals made sure nobody was harmed during the operation, which happened around 11:20am yesterday. After landing in Gonesse, they let the pilot go too.
The men then shifted into a black Renault Megane, which was eventually found burnt out at a shopping center parking lot in Aulnay-sous-Bois.
Faid and the others are suspected to have swapped into a white van.
Life
Faid credits Hollywood gangster movies like 'Scarface' for his 'success'
Faid, born in 1972, was the leader of a gang specializing in armed robbery and extortion in the 1990s.
He has often said he's inspired by Hollywood gangster movies, like Al Pacino-starrer 'Scarface' and Michael Mann's 'Heat.'
He once approached Mann at a Paris film festival, saying, "You were my technical adviser."
In 2009, he even co-wrote a book about his life of crime!
Prison break
In 2013, he broke out of prison within half hour!
This was Faid's second prison break. In 2013, half an hour after arriving at the Sequedin prison outside Lille, he had made his way out: he grabbed four guards as hostage and blew through several doors with dynamite.
That time too, he released all four.
He was nabbed six weeks later.
Last year, he was given 10 years' imprisonment for that jailbreak.
Manhunt
Minister calls it a "spectacular escape" by "well-prepared commando unit"
French Justice Minister Nicole Belloubet couldn't help calling it "a spectacular escape." "It was an extremely well-prepared commando unit that may have used drones to survey the area beforehand," she said.
Ironically, the area where the chopper had landed wasn't netted, because inmates don't use it, said prison union representative Martial Delabroye, "except to leave the prison."
A large manhunt is underway now.