A prisoner who had already served half of his five-year sentence for stealing a motorbike sawed the bars off his cell’s window and escaped in the dead of the night on Tuesday in Kampong Chhnang, prison officials said yesterday.

Ear Tal, 30, was not a troublemaker, and his escape surprised all the prisoners and prison guards, said Pov Vuthy, Kampong Chhnang provincial prison chief, adding that he remains on the loose.

The prison had big and firm bars that no prisoner could break without extra support, said Pol Vuthy, Kampong Chhnang police chief.

“At the moment, our authorities are questioning the guards at the prison from that night in order to find the root cause of what made this prisoner escape successfully like this.”

On September 10, two prisoners working on the construction site of a new prison in Kampot escaped by pretending to go to the bathroom. They have yet to be found, provincial prison chief Chea Rithy said.