4 Prisoners in Transit Use Shotgun to Escape : Crime: Extradition by private agency goes awry. No one injured in incident near Gorman.

Four prisoners being transported by a private extradition agency escaped near Gorman after one of them produced a concealed sawed-off shotgun and demanded the keys to the car from its driver, authorities said Friday.

The four prisoners and the green Oldsmobile station wagon in which they escaped were still missing Friday night, authorities said. They were being transported to face charges that included aggravated assault, robbery and parole violations.

The escape began about 6:30 p.m. Thursday when one of the prisoners, Raymond Vansandt, 35, feigned nausea and asked the driver of the station wagon to pull over next to the Hungry Valley Road off-ramp of the Golden State Freeway, said Deputy Chris Wahla, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

The driver, David Hollie, 42, had stepped out of the car and opened the wagon’s rear door to let Vansandt vomit, Wahla said, when the prisoner sat up and pointed the weapon at him. Authorities later found the gun near the location where the car stopped, officials said.

Vansandt released the other prisoners from their handcuffs and then locked Hollie and his wife, Ellen, 33, to a telephone pole, officials said.

The prisoners drove off in the station wagon and the Hollies later freed themselves with a spare key that David Hollie kept in a pocket, authorities said. They flagged down a motorist, who drove them to the Valencia area.

Sheriff’s officials said representatives of the extradition agency, Professional Interstate Extradition of Bloomington, Ill., told them they did not know how Vansandt smuggled the shotgun into the car.

Following company policy, the Hollies were unarmed, except for a stun gun, Sheriff’s Lt. Dennis Burns said.

Vansandt had been picked up in Idaho for extradition to Michigan on a parole violation, Burns said. Prisoner David Jeffrey, 30, was being transported from Pueblo, Colo., to Cameron County, Tex., to face a robbery charge. A third prisoner, Kimberly Rodenborg, 19, was being extradited from Nebraska to Arizona to face a charge of aggravated assault, he said.

The fourth prisoner was Frank Gonzalez, 46, who is wanted in New Mexico for a parole violation charge. The Hollies were heading to Los Angeles, where they were to pick up two additional inmates at the Los Angeles County Men’s Central Jail, Burns said.