Ministry assigns elite police to search for escaping prisoner

Triệu Quân Sự has escaped from prison three times. — Photo courtesy of the Ministry of Public Security

HÀ NỘI — A convicted killer has escaped from prison and is on the run. 

Triệu Quân Sự has been described as dangerous, and was serving time for robbery and murder. This is the third time he has escaped.

The Criminal Police Department under the Ministry of Public Security has assigned an elite police unit to search for Sự who fled the jail on Tuesday.

He escaped from a prison in Thành Long Commune, Thạch Thành District, the central province of Thanh Hóa.

Sự, 31, is from Phú Cường Commune, Đại Từ District, the northern province of Thái Nguyên. He used to be in the military but frequently stole and deserted.

In 2012, he murdered the owner of a coffee shop in Long Biên District in Hà Nội to rob the premises. In 2013, he received life-sentence for murder, robbery and desertion.

At the end of 2015, while serving his sentence in Quảng Ngãi central province, Sự escaped from prison. He was arrested a month later, and was sentenced to three more years for escaping and three years for robbery. 

In June 2020, while in prison in Quảng Ngãi, Sự climbed over the watch-tower, clinging to the water pipe to escape. He was arrested 15 days later in a computer games shop in Tam Kỳ City, Quảng Nam Province.

The Thanh Hóa authorities on Tuesday night issued an urgent notice to search for Sự.

The police advised that Sự was very dangerous, so when people detect him, they should not approach him but immediately report his whereabouts to the nearest authorities.

Vũ Trọng Hùng, chairman of the Thành Long Commune People’s Committee, said that after receiving information, the commune immediately alerted six stations to search for Sự.

Local authorities also broadcast details of the case on the loudspeaker system so that residents can be vigilant.

Hùng added that at about 10pm on Tuesday, the police discovered a mobile phone sim card, which had just been active, in a forest behind the prison in Thành Long Commune. The police suspected that the sim card was used by Sự. — VNS