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After days of a large-scale manhunt for an escaped prisoner suspected of terrorism, a debate has erupted in Britain about the crisis in the penal system.

Officers were able to arrest the 21-year-old in the Chiswick area of ​​London on Saturday. A civilian patrol had “pulled the man off a bicycle” on a canal in the west of the British capital, Scotland Yard said.

The arrest ended a large-scale manhunt lasting several days, involving 150 officers and significantly tightening security checks at ports and airports.

The ex-soldier escaped from Wandsworth Prison in south-west London on Wednesday morning by clinging to the underside of a food delivery truck.

The case caused an uproar and put a spotlight on Britain’s ailing prison system. Many prisons are overcrowded and outdated. Some buildings date from the 19th century. In addition, there are staff shortages, high rates of illness and major fluctuations.

The writer Oscar Wilde, who was persecuted for his homosexuality, was imprisoned in Wandsworth Prison, which opened in 1851. Recently, the German former tennis player Boris Becker also spent some time in prison.

Forty prisoners have now been transferred from Wandsworth to other prisons, British Justice Secretary Alex Chalk told Sky News on Sunday. It was purely a precautionary measure, the conservative said. An initial evaluation of the safety measures also showed that appropriate regulations were in place and that there were sufficient staff present.

It remains a mystery how the 21-year-old managed to escape. According to the police, they are also checking whether he received support from inside and outside the prison.

He is accused of planting fake bombs on a military base and collecting information that could be useful to terrorists or enemy states. He denied the allegations. A trial was scheduled for November.

Conditions in English prisons have long been denounced by human rights organizations and the state inspectorate. According to the World Prison Brief website, England’s 118 prisons are operating at 111 percent of their official capacity and housing more than 87,000 prisoners. By comparison, in Germany the occupancy rate is 77.6 percent. (sda/dpa)