Fire Service launches manhunt for ‘missing’ inmate inside Chattogram jail

The Fire Service and Civil Defence in Chattogram has launched a manhunt for an inmate who recently went ‘missing’ and is trying to find out whether he is hiding somewhere inside the prison.

The fire crews began the hunt on Monday, the first day of the operation following the constitution of an investigation committee by the prison authorities.

Deputy Inspector General of Prisons Md Sagir Mia is leading the investigation. “Because we are not sure whether the inmate fled, the Fire Service personnel looked for him inside the jail.”

The committee will look into how the detainee managed to flee once he is not found inside the prison, the DIG added.

Its members met the Chattogram divisional commissioner and deputy commissioner on Monday.

Authorities reported that the detainee, Farhad Hossain Rubel, who had been in prison since Feb 9 after being arrested by the Sadarghat police in a case over stabbing an individual to death late on Feb 6 night, had gone missing in the wee hours of Mar 6.

After filing a general diary with the Kotwali police that morning, the jail authorities lodged a case over the matter that night.

“Chattogram jail authorities said that the detainee went missing. This can happen in two ways, either alive or dead. It may be that he got stuck somewhere inside the prison while trying to escape. But the jail does not have the logistics to find that out. So we called for assistance from the Fire Service.”

The committee has gathered surveillance footage from all the CCTV cameras around the prison grounds for the investigation.

“One of the CCTV cameras showed that he was walking down from Ward no. 15 at 5:16am. But we could not determine which way he went,” Sagir Mia said.

“We have to first find out how the detainee went missing. It may be that... he died while attempting to escape and we will find it out by the rotting smell. That must not be the case,” he added.

Authorities withdrew a jailor and a deputy jailor from duty, handed temporary suspensions to two other prison guards while filing a departmental case against another official over the matter on Sunday.

The two others in the probe committee are Brahmanbaria Prison Superintendent Iqbal Hossain and Bandarban’s Deputy Jailor Forkan Wahid.

Chattogram district administration has formed a committee of its own to look into the incident.