French police capture jailbreak gangster in industrial estate hotel

France’s most-wanted criminal was captured at dawn on Wednesday. Redoine Faïd was found hiding in a hotel on an industrial estate outside Paris six weeks after having blasted his way out of prison.

Reporters in front of the hotel where Redoine Faïd was captured Pierre Verdy/AFP

The 41-year-old career criminal was captured along with a 29-year-old accomplice and in possession of weapons and several thousand euros and was to appear before a judge in Lille, near the prison from which he escaped, in the afternoon.

He appeared to have been using the hotel in Pontault-Combaut as a hide-out for several days, police say, although they only tracked him down there 24 hours before the arrest.

Congratulating police on the operation, Interior Minister Manuel Valls said that Faïd, who was the subject of an interpol arrest warrant, seems to have travelled abroad but returned to France because he “could not resist seeing his family and above all son, whom he adored”, leading to his capture.

Investigators believe that he may have been planning a new robbery and say he was heavily disguised, wearing a wig, a beard and glasses.

Pontault-Combaut is near Villiers-sur-Marne, where police officer Aurélie Fouquet was shot dead in 2010 during a robbery that Faïd is accused of masterminding.

The heavy sentence he would have faced if found guilty of that crime may have been the motive for his dramatic escape from Sequedin prison in April.