Billionaire's killer recaptured after Monaco jail break
French police have recaptured an American male nurse who escaped from a
Monaco prison where he was serving a 10-year sentence for starting the fire
that killed billionaire banker Edmond Safra. ( AND on this day...1903 --
Try This At Home?: Harry Houdini escapes
police station Halvemaansteeg in Amsterdam.
In a dramatic jailbreak, Ted Maher sawed through the bars of his cell late
on Tuesday night.
Monaco is the Mediterranean haven for the rich and famous where Mr Safra
perished in a bizarre blaze at his 20-room penthouse three years earlier.
Shortly after justice officials in the principality confirmed the
jailbreak, police in the French riviera town of Nice announced Maher had
been recaptured.
"He escaped in the classic fashion - by sawing through the bars," one
justice official in Monaco said.
Maher, who is in his 40s, escaped with another prisoner.
Maher, an ex-soldier and Las Vegas casino security officer who was
sentenced on December 2, admitted at his trial to setting fire to Mr
Safra's apartment in December 1999.
But he argued he only meant to stage the emergency so he could rescue his
ailing employer and earn a pay rise.
Lebanese-born Mr Safra, who suffered from Parkinson's disease and had
24-hour nursing care, suffocated in his bathroom along with another nurse,
Vivian Torrente, as fumes from the blaze engulfed his penthouse.
He apparently feared attackers were in the apartment and refused to leave
the smoke-filled bathroom.
Mr Safra, the former head of the Republic National Bank of New York listed
by Forbes magazine as among the 200 richest men in the world, lived in
constant fear of being attacked and robbed.
After first saying two masked intruders had broken into the apartment,
Maher admitted to police that he had started the fire and even stabbed
himself with a knife to simulate an attack.
http://abc.net.au/news/justin/nat/newsnat-22jan2003-107.htm
