Armed robber blasts out of prison with explosives in tissue packets

An armed robber who was being held over the death of a police officer was placed on Interpol's most wanted list on Monday, two days after he took four guards hostage and used explosives hidden inside tissue packets to blast his way out of a prison in Lille, near the Belgian border. Redoine Faid freed his hostages along his getaway route.

It isn't the first time Faid has gone on the lam. He was arrested in 1998 after three years on the run in Switzerland and Israel, according to French media.

Faid was freed after serving 10 years of his 31-year sentence and swore he had turned his life around, writing a confessional book about his life of crime and going on an extensive media tour.

"When I was on the run, I lived all the time with death, with fear of the police, fear of getting shot," he told Europe 1 radio at the time.