France - 5 shot, 4 dead in French Alps, may have int'l ramifications, 2012 #2

[ZaZara]

Dramatic new Alps murders evidence as Brit girl 'remembers' details of gunman

A BRITISH schoolgirl left for dead after an Alps gun massacre which claimed the lives of her parents remembers “the white skin and bare hands of her attacker”, it has emerged. Zainab Al…

www.thescottishsun.co.uk

Not sure what to think about this article!

​

It is summer and even in Scotland the Sun is shining.....

Whenever the British press comes up with a spectacualr breakthtough in the mystery of the Annecy murders, I look up the French source.
The only French source that I can find is the report in Le Parisien, and that is subscription only.

The header mentions:

Le chef d’entreprise français, le vététiste anglais et Monsieur X : les derniers secrets de la tuerie de Chevaline​

translated:

The French businessman, the English mountain biker and Monsieur X: the latest secrets of the Chevaline massacre

BBM

As far as I am aware, Brett Martin, the British cyclist, was not on a mountain bike. I can only see half of the first paragraph of the original article, so I don't know if he is mentioned, at all or as a vétéiste, someone who rides a vélo tout terrain. An all terrain bike or a mountain bike is a specifice type of bike and not the one we see BM riding in the various pictures of him.

The French bussinesman from Lyon has been officially excluded as a suspect. Brett Martin had his hands swabbed for residue at the time, and he was allowed to go home in England. About his clothes, he told the following in 2021:

I came face-to-face with Alps killer… I could've been his 5th victim

Brett was questioned by the police in French, despite his knowledge of the language being basic at the time.


He was allowed to fly home without handing over his bloodied clothes. But Brett is reluctant to criticise the gendarme. He said: “They inventoried everything and I had my hands swabbed for residue.


“But they didn’t take the clothes I was wearing. I didn’t wash the clothes for a week or two but eventually I thought, ‘I’ve got to wash these as they’re my riding clothes.’


“They subsequently asked for them, but I said, ‘A month has gone by, it has been washed.’ They said, ‘Oh, just give it to us.’”

BBM


Which leaves us with Mr X, and we knew that already.

 

[Ellmau]

The most interesting thing is Zainab's memory of "the white skin and bare hands of her attacker".

So, no gloves.

You would expect a biker or cyclist to be wearing gloves.

Brit girl whose parents were shot in Alps tells about the killer

Zainab Al-Hilli was only seven when she was shot in the shoulder and beaten around the head during the infamous attack almost exactly a decade ago but has now provided details to police to help solve it.

www.dailymail.co.uk

 

[Ellmau]

The mystery BMW seems intriguing.

 

[chimpface]

The most interesting thing is Zainab's memory of "the white skin and bare hands of her attacker".

So, no gloves.

You would expect a biker or cyclist to be wearing gloves.

Brit girl whose parents were shot in Alps tells about the killer

Zainab Al-Hilli was only seven when she was shot in the shoulder and beaten around the head during the infamous attack almost exactly a decade ago but has now provided details to police to help solve it.

www.dailymail.co.uk

At the same time a leather jacket points to a motorcyclist...

 

[Curious_in_NC]

The most interesting thing is Zainab's memory of "the white skin and bare hands of her attacker".

So, no gloves.

You would expect a biker or cyclist to be wearing gloves.

Brit girl whose parents were shot in Alps tells about the killer

Zainab Al-Hilli was only seven when she was shot in the shoulder and beaten around the head during the infamous attack almost exactly a decade ago but has now provided details to police to help solve it.

www.dailymail.co.uk

I think it would be quite difficult to fire a gun wearing cycling gloves. Maybe they took them off? Not all road cyclists, however, wear them. It's a personal preference, and even some riders in the Tour de France don't.

I'm still holding my breath. These new articles all have the same info, culled apparently from La Parisien. It's the same vague suspicions of known characters, apart from "Mr. X". Although the Daily Mail includes mention of Martin breaking the car window to turn off the ignition. I don't remember this detail in prior stories.

 

[ZaZara]

Found the original report from Le Parisien, thanks to a French crime blogger

Le chef d’entreprise français, le vététiste anglais et Monsieur X : les derniers secrets de la tuerie de Chevaline

Part 1:

Since 5 September 2012, her fragmented memory has been rebuilding day after day, night after night. Memories have finally surfaced, a mixture of painful recollections and violent flashes. Zainab al-Hilli was 7 years old when she went with her family, British of Iraqi origin, on holiday on the shores of Lake Annecy (Haute-Savoie). It was late summer, the week her classmates had just started school in Claygate, an affluent suburb of south London. Severely injured, the girl survived the mysterious Chevaline massacre.

In June 2021, Zainab al-Hilli was interviewed by the British police at her request. The teenager, now 16, gave a uniquely detailed account of the tragedy. She recounted the beginning of the family car journey and the arrival at the Martinet car park, on the heights of Chevaline. The place is isolated, in the heart of a forest, on the edge of a small road full of potholes. She and her father get out of the BMW estate car. A local cyclist - Sylvain Mollier from Savoie - is already there, perhaps stopping off for a break. The other members of the al-Hilli family are about to get out of the car when gunfire breaks out. There is panic. Zainab hears Saad, her father, and Ikbal, her mother, ordering her to get into the car immediately. But the girl does not have the time.

In her memory, a man is holding her from behind. At first she thinks it is her father, notices the white skin and bare hands of her attacker and realises that it cannot be him. Zainab struggles but cannot break free from the grip. According to her, the killer was wearing leather trousers and a leather jacket. She was hit hard on the head by rifle butts, shot in the shoulder, and collapsed, unconscious but alive. Around her, the killer, ultra-determined, methodically shot her father, mother and grandmother in the BMW with one or two bullets to the head, as well as the cyclist on the side of the road. Only her 4-year-old sister, Zeena, survived the carnage. In a last ditch effort, her grandmother hid her under her long black skirt and saved her life, before losing her own

"The first thing I noticed when I got there was a little girl (Zainab) walking towards the road (...) She took two steps and collapsed face down (...) She gave a very short scream before collapsing. I put her in a lateral position of safety," William Brett Martin, a British man who was the first to arrive at the scene of the crime, told the police. But the witness said he did not see the shooter. A bloodthirsty man still unidentified to this day, almost ten years later.

BBM

<ADMIN NOTE: To avoid copyright violation, full, subscription only article is available at above link>

 

[Badgerette]

The only reason I can think of to wear leather trousers, is because you’re on a motorcycle no?

 

[Curious_in_NC]

Found the original report from Le Parisien, thanks to a French crime blogger

Le chef d’entreprise français, le vététiste anglais et Monsieur X : les derniers secrets de la tuerie de Chevaline

Part 1:

Since 5 September 2012, her fragmented memory has been rebuilding day after day, night after night. Memories have finally surfaced, a mixture of painful recollections and violent flashes. Zainab al-Hilli was 7 years old when she went with her family, British of Iraqi origin, on holiday on the shores of Lake Annecy (Haute-Savoie). It was late summer, the week her classmates had just started school in Claygate, an affluent suburb of south London. Severely injured, the girl survived the mysterious Chevaline massacre.

In June 2021, Zainab al-Hilli was interviewed by the British police at her request. The teenager, now 16, gave a uniquely detailed account of the tragedy. She recounted the beginning of the family car journey and the arrival at the Martinet car park, on the heights of Chevaline. The place is isolated, in the heart of a forest, on the edge of a small road full of potholes. She and her father get out of the BMW estate car. A local cyclist - Sylvain Mollier from Savoie - is already there, perhaps stopping off for a break. The other members of the al-Hilli family are about to get out of the car when gunfire breaks out. There is panic. Zainab hears Saad, her father, and Ikbal, her mother, ordering her to get into the car immediately. But the girl does not have the time.

In her memory, a man is holding her from behind. At first she thinks it is her father, notices the white skin and bare hands of her attacker and realises that it cannot be him. Zainab struggles but cannot break free from the grip. According to her, the killer was wearing leather trousers and a leather jacket. She was hit hard on the head by rifle butts, shot in the shoulder, and collapsed, unconscious but alive. Around her, the killer, ultra-determined, methodically shot her father, mother and grandmother in the BMW with one or two bullets to the head, as well as the cyclist on the side of the road. Only her 4-year-old sister, Zeena, survived the carnage. In a last ditch effort, her grandmother hid her under her long black skirt and saved her life, before losing her own

"The first thing I noticed when I got there was a little girl (Zainab) walking towards the road (...) She took two steps and collapsed face down (...) She gave a very short scream before collapsing. I put her in a lateral position of safety," William Brett Martin, a British man who was the first to arrive at the scene of the crime, told the police. But the witness said he did not see the shooter. A bloodthirsty man still unidentified to this day, almost ten years later.

BBM

<ADMIN NOTE: To avoid copyright violation, full, subscription only article is available at above link>

It's interesting that the Le Parisien article doesn't mention Martin thinking to turn off the motor. The Daily Mail must have added that info from another source.

 

[Ellmau]

Yes, leather trousers do point in that direction, especially in the summer heat.

So based on the quote below, Zainab lost consciousness, then came to and was able to walk down the road before collapsing again. So if that is true, it must have been some time before Martin arrived. TBH I can see why he might come under suspicion.

She was hit hard on the head by rifle butts, shot in the shoulder, and collapsed, unconscious but alive. Around her, the killer, ultra-determined, methodically shot her father, mother and grandmother in the BMW with one or two bullets to the head, as well as the cyclist on the side of the road. Only her 4-year-old sister, Zeena, survived the carnage. In a last ditch effort, her grandmother hid her under her long black skirt and saved her life, before losing her own

"The first thing I noticed when I got there was a little girl (Zainab) walking towards the road (...) She took two steps and collapsed face down (...) She gave a very short scream before collapsing. I put her in a lateral position of safety," William Brett Martin, a British man who was the first to arrive at the scene of the crime, told the police. But the witness said he did not see the shooter.

 

[vls12345]

I'm just now returning to this story from so long ago after seeing an article pop up in The Sun. (Probably similar to The Daily Mail story.)

I haven't gone back to refresh my memory but did LE determine that the family was the intended target rather than the French cyclist SM being the target? Who was collateral damage to who? (Thanks in advance for anyone more familiar with the details who can refresh my memory on that point.)

Editing to add: I guess I should have read the entire Sun story prior to posting!

Alps Murders cops confirm re-arrest of ‘mystery biker’ linked to slaying

COPS have confirmed the re-arrest of a “mystery motorcyclist” seen speeding away from the scene of the slaying of a British family in the Alps a decade ago. Surrey businessman Saad al-H…

www.thesun.co.uk

(Story from January of this year.)

"...

Last year, detectives said they were investigating a possible link between the murders and a bungling gang of contract killers based in Paris.

Pistol rounds found at the home of one member – a former police intelligence officer – were of the same calibre as those fired by the antique Luger PO6 used to kill the Al-Hillis.

If the gang was involved, it would be more likely that cyclist - Mr Mollier - was the primary target, investigators believe.

He was a welder in a subsidiary of the Areva nuclear power group, but tensions in his personal life are more likely to have provided a motive for him being targeted, they said.

Zaid al-Hilli repeated his claim that Mollier was the target and his relations were merely innocent by-standers.

“It’s obvious Mollier was the target my brother and his family were just tourists on holiday they had no itinerary and were just along the roaf because they were on holiday but sadly it was the wrong plane at the wrong time," he said.

..."

The Sun story, if anyone is interested. (Probably just a repeat of the stories which have been posted recently.)

Dramatic new Alps murders evidence as Brit girl 'remembers' details of gunman

A BRITISH schoolgirl left for dead after an Alps gun massacre which claimed the lives of her parents remembers “the white skin and bare hands of her attacker”, it has emerged. Zainab Al…

www.thesun.co.uk

(Most recent story.)

 

[Badgerette]

Originally I thought SM was the target - since he was local and there was so little information about him anywhere. But the longer this goes on, the more it seems like it was some completely lucky random/thrill kill. If the AH were the target, the killer would have been sure to at least kill the 4 family members sent to kill. You wouldn't leave the younger child in the car alive. Leaving her alive shows that the killer wasn't familiar with the AH.
If SM was the target, how lucky for the assassin that SM just so happened to pass WBM on his hill climb...had he not passed him- WBM would have been there first followed by SM.
The only other option would be if WBM was the target, but did anyone know he intended to ride his bike on that route, that day?

 

[evilwise]

You might wear leather clothing if you expect someone might try to stab you. A child might also easily mistake Kevlar for leather.

 

[ZaZara]

It's interesting that the Le Parisien article doesn't mention Martin thinking to turn off the motor. The Daily Mail must have added that info from another source.

I have read the entire report of Le Parisien, and I was pleasantly surprised that the Daily Mail added other details of the case. IMHO the reporters at the DM have worked on the case before, and that by itself is a good thing. However, there is no ground to claim that there are now three suspects, as the DM claims.

The report of Le Parisien goes more into detail into the reconstruction that was made last year. French LE had questions about the timing and obesevations of various witnesses, specifically Brett Martin and the motorcyclist from Lyon, and put them all together to do a check of sorts. Neither witness Martin, nor the motorcyclist who saw nothing, are suspects in the sense of the law.

I'll look up my notes and see what I can find, but that will be later.

 

[Curious_in_NC]

<RSBM>

As far as I am aware, Brett Martin, the British cyclist, was not on a mountain bike. I can only see half of the first paragraph of the original article, so I don't know if he is mentioned, at all or as a vétéiste, someone who rides a vélo tout terrain. An all terrain bike or a mountain bike is a specifice type of bike and not the one we see BM riding in the various pictures of him.

This BBC broadcast has a reconstruction that portrays BM riding a mountain bike. In his interview BM also makes comments about how SM, in contrast, was on a road bike when he passed BM earlier that day, and BM thought the road bike would be poorly suited to the potholes on the climb up the road ahead of them.

It's possible SM was actually riding a cyclocross type bike, similar looking to a road bike but with more rugged tires, which would have been more suitable for rougher roads. Either way, since BM was on a mountain bike, it in part explains why he would have been several minutes behind SM when he eventually reached the crime scene.

The later pictures of BM are with a road bike. Many cyclists ride both types of bikes.

ETA The BBC broadcast is over three years old so some info may not be up to date.

 

[ZaZara]

Tuerie de Chevaline : une profileuse britannique a dressé un portrait-robot psychologique du tueur

Tuerie de Chevaline : "Paranoïa", "motivation interne"... Une spécialiste a établi le profil psychologique du tireur

The famous case of the Chevaline massacre is about to officially become a "cold case". The investigation into the mysterious assassinations of three members of a British family and a French cyclist on a forest road in Haute-Savoie in September 2012 is to be transferred to the new judicial division dedicated to "serial and unsolved crimes".

According to our information, on 18 July 2022 the Annecy prosecutor's office issued a request for the transfer of jurisdiction to this national court, which was created in March and is based at the judicial court in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine).

(..)

However, this does not mean that the investigation has reached a dead end, according to the Annecy prosecutor, who evokes a conscious choice, without pressure, in line with the creation of a cold case unit with more means and time to identify a culprit. The case of the Chevaline massacre will thus be re-examined with a fresh eye by one of the three specialised investigating judges of the new Nanterre jurisdiction.

And the magistrate will be able to rely on an unpublished judicial document, which we reveal: the psychological sketch of the killer. This was produced in July 2020 by a British "profiler", a consultant forensic clinical psychologist, after reading hundreds of thousands of court records, multiple interviews with French and English investigators and an analysis of existing criminological literature on "multiple killings".

"An internal motivation of his own that is entirely independent of the victims
He is probably 99% male, aged between 30 and 40," the expert concluded. (...) "I put forward the theory that the perpetrator of the Chevaline attacks acted on an internal motivation of his own that is entirely independent of the victims of this case," the expert concluded.

Like the French investigators, the British psychologist favours the idea of a local and isolated act, possibly committed by a local killer with an unstable psychological profile.

She lists a few possible personality traits: "unemployed or in an unskilled job", "living alone" or solitary in "a closed family environment", "a former soldier" or a person with an attraction for weapons: "collector, hunter, club shooter or paramilitary".

An "expert" who meticulously "planned" and "organised" the killing

(...)

During the express killing, the killer used a Luger P06 revolver, an old weapon made during the Second World War and prized by collectors, before disappearing. Seventeen of the 21 bullets fired hit their targets, leading the profiler to believe that an "expert" had meticulously "planned" and "organised" the killing.

"Significant psychological clues from the crime scene and subsequent investigations indicate that the perpetrator planned to kill several people in the Combe d'Ire car park and planned to flee," the profiler analyses. (...) It is unlikely that the car park was chosen at random. (...) The most plausible scenario is that the perpetrator had no connection with the victims and was unaware of their arrival at the car park at the time. A place that the killer could be "well acquainted with".

A random quadruple murder, in short. According to the expert, the killer kept the murder weapon (damaged by a blow to the head of one of the two survivors) and tried to repair it after the carnage.

For the psychologist, there is a possibility that the killer was suffering from psychological disorders, even a form of "paranoia" and that he could have been driven by "hatred for a particular community or target". In other words, a racist impulse, unless it was the desire to kill a cyclist. The expert does not rule out the possibility that the killer was also "driven by voices".


BBM


"we can reasonably assume that the author is someone from the area"

 

[Officer Dibble]

Dramatic new Alps murders evidence as Brit girl 'remembers' details of gunman

A BRITISH schoolgirl left for dead after an Alps gun massacre which claimed the lives of her parents remembers “the white skin and bare hands of her attacker”, it has emerged. Zainab Al…

www.thescottishsun.co.uk

Not sure what to think about this article!

​

That a French man might have brown hands? That an Icelandic or English man might have white hands? etc etc? Where is your not sure what to think, taking you in your thoughts?
JMO

 

[General wooster]

Frederick Vaglio and his associates are the key in unlocking the murders. IMO this is a contract killing with SM as the target. All trails lead back to this scenario.

 

[MsMiniSleuth]

WHEN three members of the British al-Hilli family and a passing cyclist were shot dead in a remote part of south west France, the world waited to discover their killer.

Yet ten years on, despite an investigation by 100 French cops and 60 British, and four suspects being quizzed, the Alps murders remain a mystery.

In an exclusive interview, Zaid al-Hilli, 63, brother of murdered Saad, today brands the French police’s handling of the case “despicable”, and “utterly incompetent”, accusing them of racism because of his family’s Middle-Eastern heritage.

[...]

Now Zaid, a golf club payroll manager from the South Coast, tells The Sun: “I’m not sure there was ever a true investigation. I don’t believe a word the French authorities say to us any more.

“We’ve been waiting ten years, but the current police operation could be looking for another 100 years and not get a breakthrough.

“I like to think there is always hope. But I do believe the only hope we have is that the case is taken out of the local police’s hands and someone with more competence tries to find the people who really killed our family.

“The French police have made a catalogue of errors, they contaminated the crime scene early on without thinking and have trampled on our lives.

“I also wonder if more attention would have been given to the case if my family were French..."

[...]

My brother was killed 10yrs ago - I know who French cops should be looking at

WHEN three members of the British al-Hilli family and a passing cyclist were shot dead in a remote part of south west France, the world waited to discover their killer. Yet ten years on, despite an…

www.thesun.co.uk

 

[ZaZara]

Dix ans après, le mystère de la tuerie de Chevaline est toujours intact

Ten years on, the mystery of the Chevaline massacre remains complete


On 5 September 2012, in the hills above Lake Annecy, four people were brutally murdered, three members of the same British family of Iraqi origin and a cyclist from Ugine. In a decade of investigation, several people were suspected, but no culprit was ever named.

The investigators first turned to the possibility of a family conflict: a dispute over a large inheritance within this Anglo-Iraqi family. The brother of Saad Al-Hilli, the father of the family killed by a bullet in the head, was taken into custody, but further investigations yielded nothing.

The life of Saad al-Hilli's wife, who was also killed, was also dissected when investigators discovered that her first husband, an American, died in the United States on the same day as the Chevaline killing. The official cause of death? A heart attack and nothing to link the two cases.

Because Saad Al-Hilli was an engineer and worked in a company specialising in satellites, the possibility of industrial espionage was pursued, again without result. The investigators also wondered if the trail was not rather local, this time favouring the hypothesis that the cyclist from Ugine, Sylvain Mollier, was the number one target. But without further success.

Ten years later, the Chevaline murder file has 95 volumes containing more than 8,000 documents. At the beginning of the investigation, 90 gendarmes of the investigation section of Chambéry were mobilised. They heard hundreds of witnesses, checked thousands of mobile phone numbers, requested hundreds of analyses and placed several people in custody, but without success.

Today, a group of about ten investigators is continuing the investigation. The most important details of this extraordinary investigation have been entered into the Anacrim software: a computer tool that allows the gendarmes to establish links between different cases. They keep the hope, perhaps, of seeing the weapon of the Chevaline massacre resurface. This famous Luger P06 pistol with which, on 5 September 2012, the perpetrator fired 21 times. In the meantime, the motive, as well as the identity of the perpetrator of the Chevaline massacre remain an enigma.


BBM


https://www.lanouvellerepublique.fr...-le-quadruple-meurtre-le-mystere-reste-entier

 

[dalsglen]

Wow, 10 years. I'm beginning to think this won't ever be solved.