French Prisoners Flee in Helicopter
About 500 police combed the highways and hillsides of southern France on Sunday, searching for an escaped convicted murderer plucked from prison by a helicopter and two accomplices.
Five people are thought to have been whisked away from Marseilles’ Baumettes Prison by a helicopter that swooped over the exercise yard Saturday afternoon, dropping lines that prisoners grabbed.
The helicopter then let the prisoners down on a nearby soccer field to allow them to climb aboard. The aircraft reportedly flew them to an airstrip, where the prisoners broke up into two groups.
Three escapees were quickly caught, all wounded by gunfire from prison guards, and one escapee was found dead near the airport, police said.
Police searched for the remaining escapee and his accomplices--a man who rented the helicopter and forced the pilot at gunpoint to fly to the prison, and a woman who accompanied him.
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