Two guards shot dead after prison van escape and criminals on the run

Two guards have been shot dead and a ‘highly dangerous’ inmate is now on the run after a prison van was attacked this morning.

Four armed men ambushed the prison convoy which was transferring detainees, at a toll booth near Val-de-Reuil, Normandy, around 11am. The masked attackers with machine guns blocked the truck as it took the detainee to Rouen, where the inmate was due to be presented to a judge. Footage shared widely online from inside a bus shows a black van on fire after it ploughed into the prison van. Masked gunmen can be seen aiming their weapons at the van in front of terrified onlookers.

At least one inmate is on the run with the armed criminals in two vehicles. One of the suspects on the run is Mohammed Amra, 30, a gang boss known to the courts for attempted homicide. France’s justice minister confirmed two guards had died and three people left seriously injured.

The escaped prisoner is a 30-year-old career criminal nicknamed ‘The Fly’. His latest conviction was for burglary, and he also has a past conviction for attempted murder. A police source told Le Parisien that he was ‘the head of a narcotics network’ in France, and accordingly considered hugely dangerous. At the time of the attack, he was being transferred from one detention centre to another, on a route that should have been secret.

One of the cars used for the escape, a white Audi A5, has since been found burnt in the town of Watteville. The second, a BMW 5 series, was seen heading in the direction of Louviers and Evreux.

French Minister of Justice, Éric Dupond-Moretti, wrote on the X social media platform: “Two of our prison officers have died, three are seriously injured. All my thoughts are with the victims, their families and their colleagues.” He added that he would “immediately” go to the ministry’s crisis unit. Minister of the interior Gérald Darmanin, who heads a department equivalent to the UK’s Home Office, said: “Sincere and saddened condolences to the bereaved families and agents of the Ministry of Justice. The “Epervier” plan was triggered. All means are being used to find these criminals. On my instructions, several hundred police officers and gendarmes were mobilised.”

The regional president of the Eure region said he was “frozen with horror” by the “appalling carnage”, adding: “I sincerely hope that the gang of killers who carried out this bloody attack will be quickly arrested. All my thoughts go to the families of the service agents, penitentiary who escorted the detainees and who were killed or seriously injured during this attack which gave them no chance. I also think of all the prison administration guards who, every day, guard prisoners at the risk of their lives.”

Emmanuel Macron, the president of France, tweeted this afternoon: “This morning’s attack, which cost the lives of prison officers, is a shock to us all. The Nation stands alongside the families, the injured and their colleagues. Everything is being done to find the perpetrators of this crime so that justice can be done in the name of the French people. We will be intractable.”

Footage shared online from the scene in northern France showed attackers in hoods holding guns, with armed officers later seen patrolling the side of a main road. Military police officers (gendarmerie) in the region activated the Épervier plan, which placed all levels of security and high alert and deployed armed police to cover and search the entire department of Eure. Around 200 members of the military police force are confirmed to have been at the scene.

A section of the National road 154 was closed by police in for an “indefinite period”. Helicopters are flying over the area to find the prisoners, while police from the local search section have also been mobilised. The GIGN tactical firearms police unit is also reported to be involved.

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