Police have warned the public not to approach a convicted murderer who escaped from custody after two armed men ambushed prison guards outside a Liverpool hospital.
Shaun Walmsley, 28, was being escorted from an appointment at Aintree University Hospital when guards were confronted by two men brandishing a knife and a gun.
"The guards were putting him into a cab... when two masked men suddenly appeared," Sky News crime correspondent Martin Brunt reports. "They threatened the guards, who allowed the prisoner to go with these men."
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None of the officers were harmed.
The three men escaped in a gold Volvo and detectives are now searching CCTV footage of the area while police patrols are carrying out an "extensive search" across the city, the Liverpool Echo reports.
Walmsley is three years into a 30-year minimum sentence at HMP Liverpool for the murder of rival drug dealer Anthony Duffy in May 2014.
Duffy was stabbed "repeatedly and brutally" near a railway track in Aintree in a row over an alleged plot to steal cannabis belonging to Walmsley's gang. He died of his wounds in hospital.
Walmsley is described as 6ft tall with dark brown hair and blue eyes. At the time of his escape, he was wearing dark jogging bottoms and a dark jacket.
Merseyside police have appealed for anyone with information that could help their search to come forward.