Two prisoners are on the run from Pentonville after reportedly fooling prison guards by putting mannequins in their beds.

The pair are believed to have cut through their cell bars before scaling the north London jail’s perimeter wall.

Unconfirmed reports suggested the prisoners escaped using diamond-tipped cutting equipment.

The daring dash for freedom echoes the notorious escape from Alcatraz island – made into a film starring Clint Eastwood – in which convicts made dummy heads made out of paper and hair from the prison barber.

The escape was said to have been discovered this morning when prison officers found the mannequins.

It is understood the pair were from G wing, the same part of the jail where inmate Jamal Mahmoud was stabbed to death last month.

This afternoon, the Ministry of Justice confirmed two inmates were on the run but did not reveal their identities.

Scotland Yard said police were called to the prison shortly before midday on Monday after two male inmates, aged 28 and 31, had escaped.

A spokesman said: "Police in Islington were called to HMP Pentonville at 11:44pm on Monday, November 7 following reports of two escaped prisoners.

"Officers attended and established with prison staff that two male prisoners, aged 28 and 31, escaped from the prison. Enquiries are ongoing to locate them."

HMP Pentonville in north London is a category B Victorian prison which opened in 1842 and holds more than 1,200 adult men.

Last year, the prison was singled out by former justice secretary Michael Gove as "the most dramatic example of failure" within the estate.

Previously, convicted murderer John Massey was on the run for 48 hours after escaping the prison in 2012.

He managed to break-out using a makeshift rope to scale the wall of the prison before he was found in hiding in a two-bedroom cottage in Faversham two days later after a nationwide manhunt.

Massey was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of a man at a pub in Hackney in 1975.

Last December, a prison was involved in a standoff with police after escaping his cell and climbing onto the roof of the prison.

He was brought down after negotiating with prison staff for more than an hour.