A CONVICTED killer who escaped from custody while being treated for cancer in a North-East hospital and went on the run for 12 years was back behind bars last night.

Murderer Alan Byrne was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1985 after being convicted of gunning down a security guard during an armed robbery in London.

Ten years later, while serving time at Frankland Prison, near Durham, he was being treated for cancer at Newcastle General Hospital when two masked men burst in and threatened prison staff with guns.

Byrne and the two gunmen ran off to a getaway vehicle waiting in the hospital car park. The red Rover was later found abandoned in Arthur’s Hill, Newcastle.

Byrne then went on the run and remained at large until being arrested in 2007 in the Netherlands for drugs offences.

He was released from the resulting eight-year sentence in Holland on Thursday, October 25, but extradited to the North-East to be sent back to prison. He was also charged with firearms offences relating to his escape.

Following a joint operation involving Northumbria Police, the Dutch authorities, the Metropolitan Police and the Serious Organised Crime Agency, the 62-year-old, originally from Glasgow, appeared at South Tyneside Magistrates’ Court on Thursday, flanked by security guards.

Wearing a grey hooded top, bespectacled Byrne refused to speak to the court. Solicitor Geoffrey Forrester was asked to identify him.

Special prosecutor Kingsley Hyland said Byrne was sentenced to 20 years’ jail for murder but this was later extended to 30 years.

Byrne was refused bail and sent back to Frankland Prison to complete his sentence. He will not be released until after August 2031.

Byrne’s original conviction came following an armed robbery in June 1984, when he and an accomplice murdered Securicor guard John McWilliams, 58, in an attempt to steal £9,500 in Brentford.

Following his escape, Northumbria Police said he may have been sprung by other criminals who wanted to kill him, as it was believed he had many enemies in London’s criminal underworld.

Top-security Frankland Prison holds many of the UK’s most dangerous criminals.