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In the 1970s, a wave of murders perpetrated by the French Charles Sobhraj shocked Asia.
Known as the “snake” or “bikini killer,” Sobhraj acted with determination and was known for his tricks in evading authorities using the passports of his victims, who were once Western tourists roaming the road. saying hippie trail from the Indian subcontinent.
The dramatic life of the notorious serial killer, now 77, has inspired literary and cinematographic works and, most recently, a television series co-produced by the BBC and Netflix.
But Who really was “the Serpent” and how does he spend his days today?
Born in Saign in 1944, son of an Indian trader who refused him paternity and of one of his Vietnamese employees, Sobhraj obtained French nationality when, after the separation of his parents, his mother married a French soldier and moved to Marseille. the south of France.
His father’s rejection marked him and caused him resentment and hatred: “Will make you regret for failing in your duty as a father, ”Sobhraj wrote in his diary.
A terrible prediction that may have come true.
During his adolescence, he never finished integrating in Europe. He was involved in street robberies and car thefts in Paris. He was in and out of reformatories, and when he came of age he fell in jail.
Her first love
But when he left, he found a job thanks to the intervention of a benevolent, who also introduced him to Chantal Compagnon, a member of the Parisian bourgeoisie, whose fell in love to the point of obsession.
For a short time, Sobhraj tried to leave the criminal route and found a job in a restaurant, but his unrestrained taste for luxury and money quickly pushed him back into crime.
Shortly after, he was arrested again for car theft, but Compagnon, blinded by his charms, I waited for him to get out of jail and married him. Together, they embarked on a trip to the Asian continent, in which they had a daughter.
At 30, “the Serpent” had already made Thailand his new center of operations.
His speciality “
Many people who knew him agree that he was a charismatic individual.
“Charles Sobhraj’s specialty was to assassinate hippies who came to discover Asia,” he explains in an article by Vice Gary Indiana, who met “the snake” in the 1980s.
The author suggests that because of its “provincial” and “non-European” appearance, white tourists on the Hippie Trail found it interesting and “harmless”.
“Sobhraj had no qualms about ripping off these spiritually thirsty backpackers. He despised these people, regarded them as cowards and immoral,” he adds.
Why he murdered “hippies” is still a mystery, but some who have closely followed in his footsteps suggest that the answer can be found in childhood trauma.
Herman Knippenberg, a Dutch diplomat who, after the death of a Dutch couple in Thailand that the local police did not bother to investigate, began to connect the dots and uncover the crimes, believes that he killed them because they didn’t obey him easily.
“By resisting Sobhraj’s proposals, he relives the concern he had during his childhood to be rejected,” he explained in a conversation with British journalist Andrew Anthony.
Arrest and escape
By the 1970s, the Hippie Trail had become a popular destination for many young Europeans and Americans traveling from Western Europe to the Far East, the Middle East and India.
At this moment border controls They weren’t that strict and “the Serpent” took advantage.
The affair with Chantal Compagnon ended when the two were arrested in Afghanistan, he managed to escape by drugging a guard; She remained in prison, but when she got out she decided to start a new life away from her troublesome husband.
However, Sobhraj told journalist Andrew Anthony – who interviewed him in Paris in the 1990s and then in 2014 in a prison in Nepal – that Companion continued to support him financially and that they stayed in touch long after their separation. .
Two years after his arrest in Kabul, Sobhraj meets the Quebecer Marie-Andre Leclerc in Srinagar, India, and convinced her to spend the summer together in Thailand.
“Multiple identities”
Leclerc also did not resist the charms of this man whom he knew little at the time, but who would change his life forever.
Gradually she was trained, began to participate in crimes, and eventually became his accomplice.
The “bikini killer” modus operandi is to drug his victims, before they take their business.
Take advantage of the naivety of many tourists Westerners, gain their confidence by buying them or having a drink: then the victims often woke up in bed without remembering the day before.
“He was a man of multiple identities: he was once an Israeli intellectual and the other a seller of Lebanese fabrics, and travel to Asia in search of their prey, ”recalls Gary Indiana in his article published by Vice.
Polglota
Sometimes Leclerc and Sobhraj abducted their victims for days or even weeks. The Canadian gave them “medicine” which caused confusion and nausea.
more their passports were stolen travel and operate in other countries in the region, confusing authorities.
This form of stealth catapulted the French as “the serpent”.
Charles Sobhraj is said to be fluent in several languages, which has been helpful in assuming the identity of his many victims.
His ability to commit a crime has only been compared to his ability to escape from prison: He is believed to have escaped from prisons in Afghanistan, Greece, Iran and India.
The amazing party that helped him escape from prison
In 1971, he escaped from a prison in India – where he was serving a 20-year sentence for poisoning French tourists traveling on a bus – by faking appendicitis and fleeing hospital.
He was arrested again in 1976, but ten years later he was able to escape in an even more surprising way: by throwing a birthday party to which he invited both the guards and the prisoners.
The raisins and cookies delivered to the guests were injected with sleeping pills, rendering everyone unconscious except Sobhraj and four other fugitives.
According to local press, the group were so proud of their escape that they photographed themselves walking through prison gates through the streets of New Delhi.
US $ 15 million for his image
As a fugitive, Sobhraj did not go to great lengths to hide from justice and frequently went out to enjoy the nightlife. This is why it was not long before he was arrested again.
Some believe he decided to escape towards the end of his ten-year sentence in India to be captured again and face new charges. This way i could avoid extradition to Thailand, where he was wanted for five murders and almost certainly the death penalty would be imposed.
When he was released in 1997, the 20-year sentence for him to stand trial in Bangkok had expired.
Sobhraj returned to France, started a new life in Paris Chinatown, hired an agent, and negotiated interviews and photographs.
He managed to sell the rights to a film and a book for $ 15 million.
Victim of his own ego
But in September 2003, he made a mistake: he went to Nepal and was immediately recognized by a
Many say he was a victim of his own ego.
They tried him for traveling on a false passport and for the murders of two US citizens he had committed 28 years earlier.
Although he has been charged with the deaths of 20 people who were drugged, strangled, beaten or burned in India, Thailand, Nepal, Turkey and Iran between 1972 and 1982, It was not until August 2004 that “the Serpent” was convicted of murder for the first time.
As was customary, Sobhraj denied the charges, but the police assured that this time they had a “suitcase full” of evidence against him and the court sentenced him to life imprisonment.
He is currently detained in Nepal and in September 2014, he was convicted of a second murder, that of a tourist from Quebec.
Interviewed by biographer Richard Neville, author of Life and Crimes of Charles Sobhraj, the serial killer confessed: “As long as he can talk to people, I can handle it“.
Prison did not prevent him from continuing his life.
For more than 10 years, he has had a romantic relationship with Nihita Biswas, the daughter of one of his Nepalese lawyers. According to local media, he married her in 2010.
And according to the British newspaper Sunday mirror, who managed to speak to him in March, “the Serpent” still pleads not guilty.
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