Prison staff and police were last night scouring the environs of the Mazaruni Prisons for two inmates who escaped from the Region Seven facility yesterday.
Reports out of Bartica yesterday were that the inmates were in a section of the prison compound when the duo made good their escape. A source at the prison told this newspaper last evening that the prison authorities acted immediately after it became known that two prisoners were unaccounted for.
The prisoners were at a social event at a playfield within the prison compound at the time. He said that initially it was believed that three of the men had escaped.
The source said that the Guyana Police Force was informed and a party of police ranks attached to the E&F Division of the force ventured into the area yesterday afternoon in search of the men. Police stations and outposts in the region were on an all-stations alert, the source said.
This newspaper contacted the Mazaruni prisons yesterday and persons there related that an operation was on-going. A staff member noted that the prison was on lockdown and that he could not go into details about the escape. He directed all further queries to Director of Prisons, Dale Erskine who is overseas.
Repeated attempts by this newspaper to contact Home Affairs Minister, Clement Rohee yesterday were futile.
Yesterday’s incident comes within a week of a similar one in which prisoner Sherwin Bobb escaped from the Camp Street jail in the city. The man fled two weeks after he was remanded to prison for the possession of marijuana for the purpose of trafficking.
In March this year, 30-year-old Nigel Misidgain who was convicted for the unlawful possession of firearms escaped from the Mazaruni Prisons.
