Notorious Gangster Redoine Faid, Who Made Hollywood-like Prison Escape by Helicopter, Caught After Three Months

Redoine Faid, the infamous French gangster who made a daring prison escape via helicopter, has been captured after three months on the run.

Police said they arrested the 46-year-old in the town of Creil, north of Paris, without resistance in the early hours of Wednesday, Agency-French Presse said citing sources speaking to French media.

According to reports, three other family members—his brother and two other men believed to be his nephews—were also arrested, along with a woman suspected of shielding the suspects.

French Justice Minister Nicole Belloubet told Europe 1 radio: "We're going to put him in a high-security facility where he will be watched extremely closely."

Faid became known across the world following a brazen escape from prison in Reau, south-east of Paris, on July 1.

Accomplices armed with assault rifles used smoke bombs and angle grinders to break into the visitors' room and rescue Faid, who was being visited by his brother at the time.

From there, the men bundled Faid into a helicopter, which had been flown into the prison yard by a pilot who was being held hostage.

A major manhunt was launched for Faid following the daring escape, resulting in him becoming France's most wanted fugitive.

Faid was serving a 25-year sentence at the time for his involvement in a 2010 robbery that saw a 26-year-old police officer killed.

The career criminal has spent the last 20 years in and out of prisons for armed robberies and thefts, with July's incident not even the first time he's managed to escape from behind bars.

In 2013, he set off a series of explosions and took four guards hostage during an escape from a prison in Sequedin, just outside Lille. He was eventually captured after six weeks.

Faid said his obsession with gangster films led him to a life of crime, citing Scarface as one of his major influences.

In 1997, he and his accomplices carried out an attack on a security van whilst wearing ice-hockey goalkeeper masks to hide their identity, mimicking the heist movie Heat with Robert de Niro.

He told the film's director Michael Mann at a Paris film festival "you were my technical adviser" after claiming to have seen the film hundreds of times, reports the BBC.

He was released from jail in 2008 on parole after serving 10 years of a 30-year sentence for armed robbery and bank theft. In 2009, he published a book about his life growing up in the Paris suburbs and subsequent career of crime, claiming he had since turned his life around.

He was once against jailed in 2011 for breaching his terms of release, before being linked to the 2010 robbery that resulted in the death of officer Aurelie Fouquet.

In 2017, Faid was handed a 10-year sentence for the 2013 escape, as well as 18 years for his involvement in the failed 2010 robbery, later increased to 25 years.