French police arrest gangster on the run since spectacular escape

French police have arrested a gangster who went on the run following a spectacular prison escape over the summer, police sources said on Wednesday.


Police sources told Reuters that Redoine Faid, whom they had tracked since early July, after armed gunmen sprung him from jail to escape in a helicopter, was arrested in the town of Creil, north of Paris.

Faid’s arrest was also confirmed by Gerard Collomb, the outgoing interior minister, whose resignation was accepted by President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday.

Faid was serving a 25-year sentence at a prison south of the French capital for an armed robbery that went wrong and led to the death of a policewoman in 2010.