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TANGERANG, Indonesia, Sept. 22 (AFP): A Chinese drug trafficker on death row escaped from a jail near the Indonesian capital after digging a 30-meter (100-foot) tunnel from his cell, police said .
Cai Ji Fan, sentenced to death in 2017 for trafficking 110 kilograms (230 pounds) of methamphetamine, escaped from Tangerang Prison in Banten last week through the narrow tunnel, which connected to a sewer, authorities said.
“This is the second time he has escaped,” Tangerang Police Chief Sugeng Hariyanto said, adding that he also managed to get out of the cells of the National Police Criminal Investigation Department in Jakarta while in pre-trial detention.
Authorities said Cai had invited his cellmate to join him, but he had refused.
Authorities said they had recovered a crowbar, chisel, screwdriver and other tools that were used to dig the hole, speculating that they could have been obtained from construction work being carried out in a prison kitchen.
Cai’s first escape was in January 2017 through a hole he made in a bathroom wall with an iron bar.
Then, along with other prisoners, he scaled an eight-foot (2.5-meter) wall, but was recaptured in West Java three days later.
Although rare for foreigners, escapes are common in Indonesia, where most prisons are overcrowded and understaffed.
In 2018, some 90 inmates escaped from a prison in Banda Aceh after tearing down a fence during a prayer meeting.
A year earlier, more than 400 inmates escaped from a crowded prison in Riau province.
Also in 2017, four foreigners made their way to freedom from the famous Kerobokan Jail in Bali.
A Bulgarian and an Indian were captured in East Timor a week later, but an Australian and a Malaysian were never found. – AFP
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