Brother Switch Frees Suspect, French Say

A suspected Basque terrorist escaped from a high-security Paris prison by switching places with his brother during a visit, prison officials said Thursday.

The switch at the Sante prison took place Saturday but was only discovered Thursday, prison officials said.

The escapee, Ismael Berasategui Escudero, is a suspected member of the Basque separatist movement ETA who was arrested May 14 in southern France. The brother who took his place in prison was held Thursday for questioning and could be investigated on charges of helping an escape. His name was not revealed.

“There is a natural physical resemblance between the two men, which was reinforced by their thought-out desire to slip our guard,” the prison director, Alain Jego, said in a telephone interview. “It’s hard to tell them apart.”

Investigators suspect that the ETA, short for Basque Homeland and Freedom, may have directed the escape. Inmates at the Sante prison get three visits of 45 minutes each a week. Their hands are stamped with invisible ink before entering the visiting room. After the session, guards verify that the ink is still present and that visitors have none on them.

French authorities were holding Berasategui on charges of “criminal conspiracy related to a terrorist enterprise,” carrying weapons and receiving stolen goods.

The ETA has killed more than 800 people as part of a drive to carve a Basque homeland.