charles sobhraj interview 1997

The door opened and he beckoned me in. He looked small and inconsequential, but better than any 68-. year-old who's spent the last ten years in a decrepit prison has any right to look. Mr Jaswant Singh was in direct contact with me. But what was it? Kathmandu (AFP) - Charles Sobhraj told AFP in an exclusive interview on Friday that he was no serial killer and that he was innocent of the two murders that he served almost 20 years for in Nepal. The ABC team were not the only ones back then to speak to Sobhraj, who was suspected of committing at least 12 murders. New Delhi, April 28: Investigating several high-profile cases like Jessica Lal's murder, Sanjeev Nanda BMW hit and amp; run, Charles Sobhraj's escape from Tihar Jail, among others, gave Amod K . For all the moral grandeur of those words, at 75 he has spent more than half his life in prison. ", The pair stayed in touch and in 2003, Sobhraj called Dhondy, who has a natural-sciences degree from Cambridge, to ask about red mercury. In The Guardian, Observer reporter Andrew Anthony detailed his own experience talking with Sobhraj. Charles Sobhraj, then 58, surrounded by policemen as he leaves a New Delhi court on February 12, 1997. Well, you already know about it After Masood Azhars release following the Indian Airline hijacking incident (in 1999), The Indian Express had mentioned my role with the Government of India at that time. He then told me about being approached by an agent for Saddam Hussein's regime, before the invasion of Iraq in 2003, to buy red mercury, a semi-mythical substance that was said, without credible attribution, to be used in the creation of nuclear weapons. He told me he thought that they were killed because they rejected his criminal entreaties. "They couldn't help me because I was undercover.". I thought he was going to voice his anger but he just wanted my recommendation for a literary agent. They are the only things in his misspent life that hes ever been able to hold on to. Until quite recently it was a monarchist state in which the royal family lived lives of extraordinary luxury amid the surrounding squalor endured by most of its subjects. One wonders, why did you take the risk of returning to Nepal where you were a wanted man? He claimed he had emails with coded references to red mercury that he could get from Belarus. He told me that he's been thinking of me recently because he's looking for someone to ghost his autobiography. He used to be represented by Jacques Vergs, the "devil's advocate", who has defended every tyrant and war criminal from Klaus Barbie to Slobodan Milosevic. The place was empty but, said Sobhraj, it belonged to a friend. He had just been released from jail in India, where he had spent 20 years on various charges (but not for any of the murders for which he was alleged to be responsible). By chance, shortly after the call, a couple of documentary makers got in touch with me. Will your friends in the US intelligence be helping you in your rehabilitation after release from jail? GQ Shops: Bonhams' vintage and contemporary watch auctions, What the internet gets wrong about the Raoul Moat case, Gordon Ramsay on success: Everyone thinks promotion is the only natural progression, but its the opposite, Print copies & Digital access for only 1. Like other career criminals Ive met, he was a stickler for the letter of the law when he thought it might help his case. The only certainty is that the Serpent will not slip away to a quiet retirement in the French countryside. He proposed to her within weeks and promised to go straight. Eventually word got round that he was Charles Sobhraj, so one of my staff asked his name and he said, 'Sob.'" . After court in New York orders seizure, Met says will transfer 15 antique Indian Express-ICIJ Investigation: Govt welcomes Met offer to return ant LSG vs RCB Live Score, IPL 2023: Rain stopped the play, RCB 93/4 with Faf du Plessis and Dinesh Karthik at the crease, Mumbai News Live Updates: MVA's third Vajramuth rally commences; only few days left for Shinde-Fadnavis govt, says Aaditya Thackeray, GSEB 12th Science, GUJCET Result 2023 Live Updates: Results to be declared by GSEB at 9 am on May 2, JEE Advanced registration, NEET UG 2023 Live: CUET application partially re-opened. The pair ended up in Bangkok, where he posed as a gem dealer and befriended young travellers. His pattern is to befriend, then drug and rob, or drug and murder, or, while in jail, manipulate and betray. His father was a successful Indian tailor and his mother was his father's mistress, a local Vietnamese woman. 2 days ago, by Chandler Plante "It was a good enough story to bring Boris to my house so it must have been tasty," recalled Oborne. She was a little-travelled medical secretary, quiet and emotionally needy. In 1979 Thomas Thompson added an equally disturbing portrait with. Charles Sobhraj spoke to press on a plane after being freed Sobhraj has been linked to more than 20 killings between 1972 and 1982, in which the victims were drugged, strangled, beaten or burned. Sobhraj prided himself on his ability to read people. Leclerc quit her. The man himself was careful not to shed any light on the matter. All the same, he said he continued to see Compagnon while he was with his wife, who appears to have vanished from the scene. But the rest was undoubtedly a product of his pathological imagination. I dont think he realises what he does. If he did realise, he didnt appear weighed down by the knowledge. (Saurabh Das / Associated Press) I met Hooda last October and I like him as a person. I dont want to say more about it. His pattern is to befriend, then drug and rob, or drug and murder, or manipulate and betray' (Biographer Richard Neville). Also, while in Kathmandu, you married your lawyers daughter. The whole story from the Taliban to Saddam sounded like the product of an international-class fantasist's imagination. In any case, Sobhraj, perhaps surprisingly, is not a man to bear a grudge. But he hated his adoptive nation. Since then the Maoists have dominated the political scene, without ever holding complete power, and have showed themselves to be every bit as corrupt and self-serving as their predecessors. I came here to make a TV documentary on local handicrafts and to see if I can do some humanitarian work.". "He can't deal with the outside world," said Dhondy. With an obedient Indian accomplice called Ajay Chowdhury, he murdered them in a variety of fashions, including in one case setting fire to a young Dutch couple while they were still alive. Show more Show more Where Is The Serpent's Herman Knippenberg Now? (In case those names don't sound familiar, they're renamed Willem and Helena in the series.) While in prison in Kathmandu, Charles Sobhraj would make the occasional phone call to me just as he did while I covered his trial in India and during his stint in Tihar Jail. In autumn 2011, she appeared as a contestant on Bigg Boss, India's equivalent of, Feisty and articulate, she ran through all the legal flaws in the prosecution's case. So much so, I came on a business visa as an assistant producer for a French production company, Gentleman Films Prod. Get the daily inside scoop right in your inbox. Bronzich had last been seen in the company of a mysterious French gemstone dealer who looked like Sobhraj and used an alias, Alain Gautier, that Sobhraj often employed. \r\rSobhraj was born in Vietnam when it was ruled by France. I was shown into a narrow room with a long table, on the far side of which were the prisoners and on the other the visitors. It is a darkly stylish thriller about the real-life killer Charles Sobhraj's spree of attacks along the Hippie Trail in the 1970s. Sobhraj had made himself an object of passion to a Canadian medical secretary he met in Rhodes, Greecea woman named Marie-Andre Leclerc, who was vacationing with her fianc. "He was selling to the Taliban. . When Compagnon finally got out, she was able to take the child and flee to America to escape Sobhrajs destructive hold. 2 days ago, by Joely Chilcott To avoid that outcome, he escaped from prison and then allowed himself to be caught and sentenced to a term that would bring him up to 20 years - the statute of limitations on his Thai arrest warrant. While you might not be able to track down the interview footage, Sobhraj definitely became a media star following his release, reportedly talking to reporters for hefty sums after settling down in Paris. '", Dhondy turned down the offer, but became convinced that Sobhraj was involved in the illegal arms trade. He had taken whatever money he could get from his previous wives, one of whom remained perversely loyal. Between. Back in the Seventies,. But Sobhraj was not political. A martial-arts fanatic, he seemed to be physically, psychologically and philosophically armed with everything required to dominate others. Even bad deeds with good intentions can be good deeds.". He was also a student of the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche's "will to power". His story is one of deception and mass murder. Travelling as Alain Gautier, he met Leclerc in Kashmir. I hope to live for many years to come', Charles Sobhraj (left); his cell in a Kathmandu prison in 2016. Jenna Coleman, as Marie-Andre Leclerc, with Rahim in The Serpent. To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories. He was by turns funny, enigmatic, absurd and engaging. Its prison administration? "I was looking to set up a heroin deal on behalf of the Taliban.". Are you part of any more film or book projects? Everyone has good and bad sides. Whether or not he was working for the CIA, surely he must have realised that there was a risk of arrest, given that he was wanted for two murders in Nepal. It was a psychological test, the first of several that afternoon. We sat in a booth, the two men on either side of me. 184K views 12 years ago Serial killer Charles Sobhraj, behind bars, is still trying to get attention via his naive wife. Sobhraj is now serving a life sentence in a Nepalese jail for killing two tourists in 1975. But there is even less doubt that Sobhraj committed the murders. On the eve of the interview, the Nepali authorities changed their minds, and we returned home empty-handed. "I'm looking for a literary agent," he told me. Sobhraj was arrested and imprisoned multiple times for various crimes from burglary to armed robbery, but he would always be released or manage to escape, such as when he pretended to be ill,. Thanks to evidence preserved and provided by his old adversary Knippenberg, he was found guilty and given a life sentence. It's a front for selling arms. Referencing the title card, Anthony wrote, "The ABC team were not the only ones back then to speak to Sobhraj, who was suspected of committing at least 12 murders. I left Paris bemused and wondering what hed do next. GQ talks to the serial killer who beguiled the delusional and needy and wrecked the lives of almost everyone he knew - and who may be about to be released from Nepalese jail. I met Masood. Like Patricia Highsmiths Tom Ripley, he assumed different identities, using stolen passports and creating a trail of havoc wherever he went. Whats not known is that after that call, I had a very long conversation with Jaswant Singh and suggested to him a second solution: that the Government of India gives an official undertaking, endorsed by Parliament, that Masood would be released within six months, and I would try my best to negotiate with Harkat ul Ansar on that ground. Many sleep on the ground under the sky. At one moment he would lapse into philosophical musings, the next make a blackly mordant joke. "'You'll get 100,000 if you do this for us,' he said, 'because we're not selling furniture. For how long remains to be seen. He cant deal with the outside world, said Dhondy. The Midnight Hour: The Serpent (Charles Sobhraj) UTD TV 2.44K subscribers Subscribe 134K views 3 years ago This week in the season 2 premiere of The Midnight Hour, your fellow host proceeds to be. "I'd heard of him all through my life, being Indian, and his great escape from Tihar jail," said Dhondy. Concerned that other sections of the media might discover his hotel location, he suggested that we conduct the interview elsewhere. The Best True Crime Shows to Watch The Mysterious Death of Elisa Lam at the Cecil He finds himself not famous, whereas in prison hes a somebody.. Sobhraj took Johnson's advice and went to the Telegraph, but while he was still in talks with that paper, he went off to Nepal. Uncheckable. His first killing had been of a taxi driver in Pakistan several years before, but between October 1975 and March 1976 he is believed to have committed 11 more murders, nearly all of them young backpackers. Can Yohji Yamamoto save fashion from itself? Whatever life he touches, he wrecks. Some estimates number his victims as high as 24, but the truth is no one will ever know the exact figure. Originally published in the April 2014 issue of British GQ. Of course, my first priority will be to return to France. If you haven't heard of his story, Sobhraj is a Frenchman of Vietnamese and Indian descent who drugged, robbed, and murdered travelers going through Asia in the '70s. This time they are holding him, in the end they will be forced to release him and they are going to lose face for the second time. But hed acquired a third wife, an attractive 24-year-old, Nikita Biswas, the daughter of his Nepali lawyer. I still believed if at that time the government had accepted the suggestion of six months (that Masood would be released in six months), most probably, I could have persuaded Harkat ul Ansar to accept it. He didn't show Dhondy the emails but asked him to help him sell the story. Sobhraj's other main partner in crime was Ajay Chowdhury, an Indian man with whom he carried out the most brutal murders. You cant judge him the way you would other normal people. They typically have a background in crime and they tend to select their victims from a particular social group or demographic. Sobhraj met his current Nepalese lawyer, Shakuntala Thapa, through her daughter, 24-year-old Nihita Biswas, who acted as his translator during one of the Frenchman's many appeals. Nepal to release The Serpent serial killer Charles Sobhraj, Onthe Trail of The Serpent: the story behind the true crime classic, TheSerpent: a slow-burn TV success that's more than a killer thriller, TVtonight: Charles Sobhraj's life of crime, 'I saw him as an animal': Tahar Rahim on playing a real-life serial killer. He wore a playful but challenging smile as I politely declined his offer. The petition dragged on for months and finally, on August 10 (2016), the court directed the government to increase the daily food allowance. 10. He was always studying character, alive to any signs of weakness that could be exploited. But what is the Met Gala? Sobhraj wanted payment for the interview but I refused and, to my surprise, he agreed to talk. "Ask Nietzsche," he replied with a grin. I hope to live for many years to come. (modern). ", Nevertheless a few years ago, while he was working in India, Dhondy received a phone call from Sobhraj in Kathmandu Central Jail. Well, its quite well known that there is corruption in every sector in Nepal. OK, he said. He was indeed released in. Knippenbergs direct manner is well captured by Billy Howle, but while Tahar Rahims depiction of Sobhraj gets his enigmatic detachment and quiet menace, it doesnt catch what, in a way, are his more troubling qualities: wit and charm and a kind of playful sense of self-mythologising. Later, he realised that the confession might prove problematic and denied everything he told Neville about the murders. Back in the Seventies, Sobhraj murdered at least ten people, mostly Western travellers along the Asian hippie trail. Over the course of a couple of mind-boggling hours he recounted a fantastical plot in which he said he had been working for the CIA in a ruse to trap Taliban guerrillas buying arms from the Chinese triads. (8 Apr 1997) French/Nat Charles Sobhraj, the man suspected of killing 14 young tourists throughout Asia arrived in Paris on Tuesday. "This is Charles, Charles Sobhraj." In stressful situations he remains calm and plausible, regardless of what lies he tells. As Neville noted: "Whatever life he touches, he wrecks. All he really possesses are the secrets of his crimes. I wanted to know what he thought about his past deeds. There is usually also a psychological - rather than purely material - aspect to the killings, and perhaps a ritualised element too. Jaswant Singh told me he will discuss with the Cabinet. He wore a flat cap and, like all the prisoners, civilian clothes. A Bollywood film (Main Aur Charles) has been made on you. She also became his accomplice in theft and murder and ended up in an Indian prison, and died of cancer four years after her release. They, of course, refused to release the passengers but I succeeded in getting an undertaking from them that for 11 days, they would not harm the passengers, but after that, they would start executing. He talked of making money from his story, whose financial worth he lavishly -overvalued, and he also mentioned ambitions in film. With his wife behind bars in Afghanistan, he returned to France and kidnapped his daughter from her maternal grandparents. After a special plea to the prison minister, two meetings with the prison governor, three body searches and an armed escort, I entered the inner sanctum of the prison, which is run by the prisoners. The 'Karma' question He was spotted in a casino playing baccarat by journalist. This, then, was the man outside whose hotel room I stood on a warm spring day in Paris in 1997. So, have things worked according to plan? Linked with at least ten sadistic murders, Charles Sobhraj is a narcissistic pedlar of fantasies who has spent his life on the run or in prison across Southeast Asia, France and the subcontinent. Then he headed back to Asia with a plan to bust Compagnon out of jail. So when travellers who he had met began disappearing, the Thai police didnt bother investigating. He twice tried to return to Vietnam by stowing away on a ship - once he got as far as Djibouti before being discovered and sent back to France. Not only did he know that Sobhraj was guilty, he said, the case was a matter of personal catharsis. In nearly all his murders, he first disabled his victims by spiking their drinks. He told Neville that they were involved in drug dealing and he was working for a cartel, but this was nonsense. Only intellectuals." "You must talk to him.". The Serpent takes a close look at the year 1976, when a young Dutch diplomat named Herman Knippenberg followed the murders of Henk Bintanja and Cornelia Hemker in Thailand. His is a dark and tragic story that lies between what he might have been and what he became, said Neville. Sobhraj described Dhondy as a "petty middleman", while Dhondy called the threat to sue him "extortion and blackmail". He took it, got into the car, drove to Holland and gambled it all away. He escaped from three prisons in three different countries. What skills could he employ in France and who would employ him? He would befriend them, advise them on where to eat and how to buy gemstones, sometimes put them up at the Bangkok apartment he shared with his French-Canadian girlfriend, and then kill them. This is an interview of Charles being sarcastic about his murdersThis interview was banned nationally and isn't allowed to be aired, i went through alot of t. At first, he sent an envoy to meet me in Paris. He held a flamenco dancer hostage in a New Delhi hotel while he used her room to break into a gem store on the floor below. It's a dusty, noisy place, like a cross between a bazaar and a dilapidated fort. He maintains that he was quite open with the Nepalese authorities, applying for a visa in France under his own name, assured that the charges were out of date. Even if the hired killer had been in collusion with Sobhraj, that didn't explain how he entered the prison with a gun - unless someone at the self-same prison authorities turned a blind eye. '", Dhondy said Compagnon's theory about Sobhraj is that he can't live without prison, the regime, the routine, and the status he enjoys there. As Leclerc wrote in her diary, "I swore to myself to try all means to make him love me, but little by little I became his slave." But exactly why he then killed these harmless young travellers remains a mystery. The best sex toys for men, whatever your kink, The best mens trainers in the world this week, Inside the temple of Sadhguru, the internet's favourite mystic, The GQ Food and Drink Awards 2023: presenting all the winners, Dior's Peter Philips is a make-up legend and he's converting men to the cause. Migrant labourers to blame for 90% crimes in Goa: Chief Minister, Dont disclose identity of minor girl seeking termination of pregnancy: Delhi HC to Lok Nayak, Known for laughs, DC dinner spotlights risks to journalism, After conviction, BSPs Afzal Ansari disqualified as Lok Sabha member, Russia missile attack on Ukraine injures 34, damages homes, Party with highest MLAs in MVA will get CM post: NCPs Jayant Pat, AIFF looks to increase teams in I-League, number of foreigners in squad to be reduced, Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Awards, Statutory provisions on reporting (sexual offenses), This website follows the DNPAs code of conduct. BBC's (and now Netflix's) The Serpent opens with a title card that reads, "In 1997 an American news crew tracked Charles Sobhraj down to Paris where he was living as a free man." A bright but delinquent teenager, he was irresistibly drawn to crime car theft, street muggings, and then holding up housewives with a gun. 2 days ago, by Victoria Edel I too made the journey to Paris and managed to arrange an interview for the Observer with the Vietnamese-Indian Frenchman." Talking. Charles Sobhraj told AFP in an exclusive interview on Friday that he was no serial killer and that he was innocent of the two murders that he served almost 20 years for in Nepal. "He's not a revenge killer," says Dhondy. In 1975, when the Nepal police raided Sobhraj's hastily abandoned hotel room after Bronzich's body was discovered, among the few items they found was a copy of Nietzsche's Beyond Good And Evil. Up until episode six, his lead romantic entanglement is with his girlfriend and accomplice, Marie-Andre Leclerc, brilliantly played by Jenna Coleman. There was Jacqueline Kuster, a German imprisoned on drug charges, and a young Punjabi who fell in love with him having read Neville's biography. The only topic that aroused his sense of injustice was his imprisonment, which he took to be one of the great judicial miscarriages of modern times. It proved the last straw for his wife. But someone leaked to the media my presence in Kathmandu and it hit the front pages. As she would later write from her prison cell: I swore to myself to try all means to make him love me, but little by little I became his slave.. 'He finds himself not famous, whereas in prison he's a somebody' "I'm almost 70," he said. \r\rSobhraj known as \"The Serpent\" has been an embarrassment for the Indian government ever since he staged a jail break 11 years ago to avoid harsher punishment in Thailand.\r\rLast February, once his was sentence finished, India had ordered his deportation, but France refused to accept him pending checks on his past.\r\rFrance decided only two days ago to grant him a travel permit. Charles Sobhraj was once Interpol's most wanted man.

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