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An Italian mafia boss, deemed to be one of the most violent, and who escaped from a maximum security prison last year using bedsheets, has been recaptured in France. Authorities from both France and Italy confirmed his recapture.

News agency AFP, citing a source, reported that Marco Raduano was arrested on Thursday (January 1) evening when he was dining at a restaurant with a young woman.

Videos of his dramatic escape from a heavy security prison in Nuoro, Sardinia, went viral on social media. It showed him using knotted bedsheets to scale down and then drop on the ground before jumping back up and fleeing. The entire escape was caught on the surveillance camera.

Described as “dangerous”, Marco Raduano was on Europol’s list of Europe’s most-wanted criminals. The 40-year-old is the boss of the rural Gargano clan functioning in Foggia, in the southern region of Italy, Puglia – known as the ‘Fourth Mafia’, CBS reported.

He was arrested on February 1 in Corsica in France.

He had been serving a 24-year sentence for being a member of a criminal organisation, holding illegal weaponds, drug trafficking, and other crimes, according to Europol.

Italian authorities announced that Marco Raduano’s close aide and his right-hand man, Gianluigi Troiano, was also arrested near Granada in southern Spain.

“The carabinieri’s (police’s) capture abroad of two dangerous fugitives, Marco Raduano, and his right-hand man, Gianluigi Troiano, represents another major blow to organised crime,” Italian Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi said.