Alan Piper arrested at Bathurst Correctional Complex hours after escaping

A prisoner who escaped a corrections facility in Bathurst on Tuesday has been arrested outside the jail’s gates after he came back four hours later.

A man who escaped from a Bathurst jail has been found and arrested after he came back to the prison four hours later.

Alan Piper, 61, was serving time at Bathurst Correctional Complex on the Mid-Western Highway, when he was reported missing about 12pm on Tuesday.

Corrective Services sources confirmed the minimum security inmate, who was last seen about 11am, was working in a team of gardening inmates outside the prison grounds when he failed to return for a compulsory attendance check.

Alan Piper, aged 61, has escaped from prison.

Prison staff couldn‘t find the 61 year-old nearby and alerted local police, who kickstarted a widespread manhunt in the area, asking anyone who saw him to ring Triple-o.

But Piper was found and arrested by police after he turned up outside the gates of the prison about 4:30pm, over four hours after he disappeared.

Piper was serving a one-year jail term in Bathurst after being sentenced in February for property damage and domestic violence related offences, corrections sources confirmed.

He would have been released on parole on August 9, just six months into his sentence.

Police now expect to lay further charges following his bid for freedom.