A “very dangerous” British prisoner is among a group of five inmates who escaped from a Portuguese high-security jail on Saturday, officials said.
Mark Cameron Roscaleer, 39, was serving a nine-year sentence for kidnap and robbery at Vale de Judeus jail, north of Lisbon, when he escaped.
An Argentinian inmate, a Georgian prisoner and two Portuguese prisoners also broke out, Portuguese media reported.
They were named as Fernando Ferreira, 61, Fabio Loureiro, 33, Rodolf Lohrmann, 59, and Shergili Farjiani, 42.
Luis Neves, national director of Portugal's Judicial Police, said the escape had been “very well prepared”.
CCTV footage caught several of the prisoners escaping through the wall that protects the prison.
They reportedly used a ladder to scale the 20ft jail wall with the help of crime accomplices who were waiting outside for them in a small black Mercedes.
Mr Neves told Portuguese newspaper Jornal de Notícias the escape involved “details thought out down to the smallest detail”.
He added in a news conference: “When I say everything, I mean everything, including the fact that human life may be at stake here.”
A member of the prison guard union told Expresso: "They went out of the cells into the courtyard and then, with a ladder hidden outside, they climbed over the six-metre-high wall and escaped".
The prison guards’ union has criticised a lack of staffing at the high-security jail, saying there were not enough guards to properly watch the jail’s perimeter wall.
Frederico Morais, president of the National Union of Prison Guards (SNCGP), said: “What failed here is the Portuguese state, due to the lack of guards and investment. Security is at stake.”
Roscaleer was jailed for nine years in June 2020 after a trial at a court in the Algarve. He was convicted of torturing a victim by putting a battery cable clamp on him.
He was also previously jailed for four years at Chester Crown Court in March 2014 after admitting to aggravated burglary at a pub.
