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A Belgian inmate who made a dramatic escape from jail for the fourth time on Sunday was caught in the Netherlands on Tuesday, Belgian prosecutors said.
Nordin Benallal, a self-styled "escape king" with several convictions for robbery and car-jacking, was seized by Dutch police after a failed armed robbery in The Hague, a spokesman for prosecutors in the town of Nivelles said.
On Sunday, Benallal escaped from a jail in Ittre, some 30 km south of Brussels, after his armed accomplices landed a hijacked helicopter in the prison grounds.
On landing, the helicopter was immediately crowded by other prisoners, making takeoff impossible and causing it to crash. The pilot and a prisoner were slightly injured.
Benallal and his cohorts then briefly seized two prison warders as hostages and fled in a car parked nearby.
Benallal has previously run from a prison van, walked out of jail disguised in a wig and sunglasses and scaled a prison wall with a rope ladder.
- REUTERS