Prison Escapes 8
PRISON ESCAPES 8 Amazing Prison Escape In France A gang used rocket launchers and heavy weapons to blow open the outer doors of a French prison and free one of the inmates in a spectacular jail break. A group of at least four men in police uniform attacked the prison in Fresnes, south of Paris, to free Antonio Ferrara, an Italian national convicted of armed robbery who had already escaped from jail once. The men fired repeatedly with rocket launchers at the prison doors to blow them open and at the watchtowers, causing serious damage but no injuries. They entered the prison through two separate doors and then passed explosives to Ferrara, who used them to blast through the bars over his cell window and escape, in the third jail break this year in France. The entire operation at the Fresnes prison, home to some 1,800 inmates, only lasted 15 minutes. Ferrara, 29 -- who was sentenced in January to eight years in prison for two bank hold- ups committed in 1997 -- fled with his accomplices in a waiting car, which police believe had been stolen and fitted with false license plates. The fugitive, also known as "Succo", escaped from prison in 1998 during a doctor's visit with the help of an accomplice, and unsuccessfully attempted to break out of La Sante prison in central Paris last summer by using explosives. French Justice Minister Dominique Perben, who rushed to the scene immediately following the incident, deplored what he called a "military-type operation", saying the culprits had used "weapons of war".
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