A massive manhunt is under way for a prisoner nicknamed “The Fly” freed in an ambush by gunmen who shot dead two prison officers escorting him in northern France.
French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin said “unprecedented” efforts were deployed, with hundreds of officers mobilised in the search for the escaped convict Mohamed Amra and the assailants who ambushed the convoy transporting him on Tuesday morning.
Amra, 30, is on the run with four other men following the bloodbath close to the town of Val-de-Reuil in Normandy.
The violence of the attack shocked France. Prison workers held moments of silence Wednesday outside prisons in Paris and elsewhere to commemorate the officers who were killed.
The officers were named in reports on Wednesday as dad-of-two Fabrice Moello, 52, a captain who had worked for nearly 30 years in the prison service, and expectant father Arnaud Garcia, 34.
Mr Darmanin, speaking on RTL radio, expressed hope that Amra could be caught “in the coming days”.
Without giving full details about the extent of the manhunt, he said 450 officers had been deployed in the region of the attack to search for the assailants and clues about their whereabouts.
“The means employed are considerable,” he said. “We are progressing a lot.”
The convoy was transporting Amra back to jail in the Normandy town of Evreux after a court hearing in Rouen when it was ambushed on the A154 motorway.
Amra had a long criminal record, with at least 13 convictions for robbery and other crimes, the first when he was just 15, said Paris prosecutor Laure Beccuau.
He is well known to the police as the boss of a narcotics network, and for allegedly ordering a mafia-style execution two years ago.
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Mr Moello was said to be a captain in the prison service, where he had worked for nearly 30 years, and a father of two, the prosecutor said.
The other officer killed, aged 34, was a married father-to-be, she said.
Éric Dupond-Moretti, France’s justice minister, said the injured guards were all in a “life threatening” condition.
Amra was under “special surveillance”, but not considered radicalised or a terrorist suspect, said Mr Dupond-Moretti.
Amra’s nickname is linked to his multiple convictions and involvement in many types of crime, from alleged murder to aggravated burglary.
A source familiar with Amra’s criminal history said he was “nicknamed the fly, because he’s everywhere, like an annoying fly.
“He’s now with his gang members, and is considered to be extremely dangerous, and armed with some very sophisticated weapons.”
It was at around 11am on Tuesday when automatic gunfire was heard at the Incarville toll booth, on the A154, around an hour’s drive from Paris.
Stark CCTV images showed men wearing black sports clothes, with hoods up, carrying out the killings using automatic machine pistols.
Footage shared online from a bus showed armed attackers during the ambush.
They first used a car to halt a prison van taking Amara from prison to a court appearance in nearby Rouen.
One of the unidentified attackers was lightly injured, before the gang sped off in an an Audi A5 and a BMW 5 series.
The Audi was later found abandoned and burned out, but there was no trace of the assailants.
By the evening, 200 gendarmes had joined members of the elite GIGN – the Gendarme National Intervention Group – in a nationwide search for Amra and his accomplices.
Amra was last week being sentenced to 18 months for a series of aggravated thefts.
He used a gun to rob supermarkets and other businesses in the Évreux suburbs in the summer of 2019.
Amra was also being held in connection with the execution on a man in Marseille on June 17, 2022.
A polices source told RTL: “He is suspected of having ordered an assassination in Marseille on June 17, 2022.
“The charred corpse of a man was found in a burned vehicle, in the town of Le Rove, bordering Marseille. The victim had obviously been executed beforehand with a bullet to the head.”
Amra was indicted for kidnapping and sequestration leading to death by Marseille police, said a spokesman for the Paris prosecutor’s office.
Following the latest killings, prosecutors working for the National Jurisdiction for the Fight against Organised Crime (JUNALCO) have opened an enquiry into “murder and attempted murder by an organised gang” – offences punishable with a life sentence.
They are also investigating “escape in an organised gang”, “acquisition and possession of weapons of war” and “criminal association with a view to the commission of a crime”.
Earlier this year, Amra was being held at the Baumettes prison in Marseille, before being transferred to La Santé in Paris, and then Évreux.
Commenting on the latest shootings, Alexandre Rassaërt, president of the Eure Departmental Council, which covers Vale-de-Reuil, said: “I was frozen with horror when I learned of the real carnage that took place at the Incarville tollbooth.
“I sincerely hope that the gang of killers who carried out this bloody attack will be quickly arrested.
“All my thoughts go to the families of the service agents. penitentiary who escorted the detainees and who were killed or seriously injured during this attack which gave them no chance.
“I also think of all the prison administration guards who, every day, guard prisoners at the risk of their lives.”
French President Emmanuel Macron also spoke out following the murders, saying on X: ‘This morning’s attack, which cost the lives of prison administration agents, is a shock for all of us.
‘The Nation stands alongside the families, the injured and their colleagues. Everything is being done to find the perpetrators of this crime so that justice can be done in the name of the French people. We will be intractable.’
Following the ambush, the A154 was shut, with French Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin, saying on X: ‘All means are being used to find these criminals. On my instructions, several hundred police officers and gendarmes are mobilised.’
