It is an incredible blunder: an inmate of the prison center of Bordeaux-Gradignan, convicted in a criminal case, was released by mistake on Wednesday. He left the prison in place of another prisoner with almost the same name. He has since volatilized.
To one letter, they have the same last name. But they have neither the same first name nor the same profile. According to information collected by RMC and BFMTV, a 25-year-old detainee left prison in peace on Wednesday, April 30, following an incredible error in the Penitentiary Center of Bordeaux-Gradignan. Since then, he has been sought by the police and considered to be “escaped” by justice.
Originally, the Bordeaux Court of Appeal had ordered the release of a Moroccan national, sought by the authorities of his country, having to be under house arrest (and placed under OQTF by the prefecture) pending its next expulsion. But it is not that the prison supervisors extracted from cells.
The detainee realized the mistake, without saying anything
Instead, they went to seek another prisoner who almost bears the same family name, except the first letter (a k instead of an R) and whose pronunciation is identical. However, he has neither the same first name, the same age nor the same profile. This man had indeed been sentenced in November 2024 to ten years’ imprisonment by the Gironde Assize Court, in a flight file with violence that led to death, against the backdrop of drug trafficking. A conviction he had appealed, confirms his lawyer to RMC.
During his nut lifting on Wednesday in front of the prison prison transplant, the detainee on the point of wrongly released, understood that there was obviously error on the person, specifies a source close to the file at RMC and BFMTV. But he did not find the mistake of the prison administration and assured that he was indeed the prisoner concerned. He was therefore accompanied until the exit of the prison and has been since volatilized. A few hours later, when the error was noted, the other detainee was also released.
European arrest warrant
As of Wednesday evening, the public prosecutor of Bordeaux opened a judicial investigation to shed light on this affair and to find the prisoner who should never have come out. He is a man “who is not part of the top of the spectrum of organized crime”, completes a judicial source, without however minimizing his profile or the magnitude of the error made. The Bordeaux prosecutor’s office has issued a European research warrant and a European arrest warrant against the fugitive. The investigations were entrusted to Gironde’s DCOS (ex-judicial) police.
In parallel, “an administrative procedure was immediately diligent on this case to understand the causes. The consequences will be drawn after this procedure”, specifies the Ministry of Justice in RMC. Bruno Retailleau also reacted to the BFMTV microphone saying “hoping that this error will be repaired”.
