French prisoner who escaped in released cellmate's laundry bag arrested near Lyon
The young man currently in custody was arrested "at around 6 am, as he was leaving a cellar," the public prosecutor's office said in a statement. His cellmate "accomplice was not with him and has not yet been arrested."
Prison staff noticed his absence on Saturday, according to information reported by French news channel BFMTV. Sébastien Cauwel, chief director of the national prison administration, said on BFMTV that "this is an extremely rare occurrence that reveals an entirely unacceptable series of failures."
Cauwel specified that the escapee was the subject of an Interpol red notice. According to this international search request, Elyazid A., age 20, nicknamed "Joker" or "Equalizer," is 1.72 meters tall and originally from Mayotte, a French territory in the Indian Ocean. He is being investigated for murder as part of an organized group and criminal conspiracy.
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