On Sunday many Egyptians claimed that the jailbreaks and looting were deliberately orchestrated by Mr Mubarak in order to convince them that an end to his rule would simply lead to chaos.  "Egyptian state television has been showing the pictures of looting all day," said one man. "This is designed to get protesters to leave the streets and go back to guard their homes."  At the Abu Zaabal jail on Sunday, bullet marks could be seen on the perimeter walls and prison trucks lay ditched in a nearby river.  Locals claimed that thousands of prisoners had escaped after posses of Bedouin tribesmen from Sinai – an area near the Israeli border notorious for smuggling and banditry – came to spring jailed fellow clansmen from the facility on Saturday evening.  "The Bedouin came just before sunset in cars and trucks," said one eye witness from a nearby town.  "At first they just fired randomly into the air, but then they started shooting at the prison guards, who fired back. Eventually the guards could not keep control and they left the jail. Thousands of people escaped, and Bedouins took their friends off with them in trucks."  He said the escaped prisoners included members of the Muslim Brotherhood, a movement that contests elections in Egypt and aspires to be one of the power brokers in any post-Mubarak government.  On Sunday the area around the prison was still lawless, with groups of youths wandering around with clubs and gangs of looters stripping the jail of food supplies and furnishers.  There appeared to be no inmates still left in the jail, although a small number, who had only months left to serve in their sentences, surrendered themselves to a nearby mosque in the hope of not jeopardising their parole.  At the same mosque 18 bodies from the jail battle were also taken, and later removed by ambulance.  "Why didn't the army protect us?" asked one resident. "We are scared now that the town is full of criminals."  As night fell large groups of men and youths formed check points all over Cairo, some also armed with knives and pistols. On the route back from Abu Zaabal back into the city centre, The Telegraph encountered checkpoints almost every 50 yards in some areas.  "We are protecting ourselves and the people," said Mohamed Kamal, 21, wielding a large black baton. "Last night we arrested 12 criminals and handed them to the army, and today we caught another three. We support the demonstrations here but not any kind of destruction."  At a nearby police station that was attacked and burned out on Friday night, rap sheets bearing suspects' mugshots littered the streets, with locals claiming that weapons had also been stolen from the armoury.  Overall, though, apart from a currency exchange store that had been broken into, The Telegraph saw little evidence that the looting of private property had been particularly widespread.  Most Egyptians were at pains to dissociate the protests from any criminal acts.  "Please tell the world that we are law-abiding people, not thugs or thieves," said Ahmed Ghazi, 45, an engineer, as he saw The Daily Telegraph outside the burned out police station.
Egypt's anti government uprising showed signs of fraying into lawlessness on   Sunday as a series of mass jail breaks saw thousands of prisoners released   on to the streets.