The previous thread was overloading WordPress due to the number of comments. This thread has been opened to replace it.
Allowed HTML - you can use:
<a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>
The general,
accused of leading the demonstration, is charged with “taking part in an illegal gathering”
Do they charge the immigrants for ripping out the fences at Calais,
for smashing vehicle windows, for waiving knives in the faces of drivers,
for storming ferries, for storming the Chunnel?
It would seem the arrest of General Piquemal
is a political arrest.
The New Localist
What factoids are implicit but not discussed?
The shootist was french.
Z heard shouting.
The ‘profile’ and the arrest of ED and PM support this and it has never been contraindicated.
EM suggests ‘remote control – local execution’ not to mention ‘local knowledge’.
My deduction is that the killer escaped to ‘local safety’ via walking or MC (or both). By ‘local safety’ I mean home, place of work or a family/friends house in the locality.
The New Localist
I do not know if we are expected to assume that the E-FIT-SKETCH of the mysterious motorcyclist
is meant to be of the business person from LYON who also like to partake of parapente in the hills. But this mysterious person was high on Eric’s imagination for being either the shootist
or the helper of the shootist.
Is that person still 5% under suspician?
The MC like the 4×4 were the last two vehicles unaccounted for, almost everyone assumed the MC did it, Maillaud was actually more circumspect, he said due to the proximity of the crime and the man in the P-R, they wanted to speak to him as a witness, which they now have and he is cleared by the investigating magistrates.
MN, the time period logically can only be from arrest and/or first appearance in court, which was in the February and then April of 2014, so several months after the crime.
I agree GIP, the arrest of Eric D and the ‘interview’ with Menegaldo, does indicate an interest in a local being responsible, remember ZAH was arrested for ‘conspiracy to commit murder’, that I guess is the answer to at a distance.
But of course if the murderer arrived in the 4×4 RHD vehicle, it could have come from anywhere, the difficulty is explaining where it went and who was in it.
I suppose there is an argument for the Al_Hillis not knowing their assailants and happily following, taking directions from a fellow ‘Brit’ travelling in a RHD BMW 4×4 ….
The General was arrested with many others for failing to disperse, he claims he went there not to protest but to see if he could help diffuse the situation.
I doubt if being an old soldier in the FFL stops people from being racist, although in reading his words I would say he feels like many in the UK and the rest of France(the comments coming from my friends and neighbours towards the migrants/refugees is alarming – just as well the walls don’t have ears).
It’s not racist to want to protect your culture and heritage
GIP, way way back I hoped that all the local barns were checked for vehicles in hiding……
although we now know that LMC was picked up on CCTV, he isn’t the murderer or an accomplice, just stupid.
For me the ‘work’ front just doesn’t gel.
So if one year kicks in from arrest it would have been February 2015,
we have no knowledge that it has yet gone to trial.
If Two years, then February 2016
which is NOW.
So are we to assume the people who killed N.C.T.
will be in court this very month?
Will we be able to know their names or at least their aliases?
But more importantly were the family Communal-Tournier terrorised because of their relationship with Sylvain Mollier?
Remember Bluebird claimed Mr.C.T. was a relative of S.M.
M.
No? I was under the impression that you thought at one stage, as I have recently come to conclude, that the shooter made his escape using tracks down the west side of the combe, exiting via one of the routes to Marceau…
You might want to be somewhat circumspect in your reply!
As far as we know
four people interviewed as suspects.
Zaid al-Hilli a chief suspect of Eric Maillaud
Eric Devouassoux a chief suspect of Eric Maillaud
Patrice Menegaldo a chief suspect of Eric Maillaud
unnamed motorcyclist a chief suspect of Eric Maillaud
all four apparently not involved.
One from the U.K. brother of one of the deceased, least likely in my mind,
the other three all fairly local, the one who knew Sylvain found dead.
As far as we know only these four suspects, no others.
Three are from “that part of FRANCE”,
just one from IRAQ/ENGLAND
I think Zaid was Eric Maillaud’s first suspect,
so the last three suspects are “Local”,
does this tell us much?
Well first he tried to “pin it” on the brother in ENGLAND,
that does not seemed to have washed, Eric said that the answer to this mystery/crime would be found in ENGLAND.
Since then the last 2 1/2 years he has been collecting local suspects,
so I think it shows he is without a clue?
but not much else?
https://twitter.com/hashtag/Chevaline?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Michael Norton
Oh a lot else! Too much ‘else’ in point of fact.
His devotion to a strict interpretation of his job description, his overweening ‘duty’ to the press, has laid it bare for all to see.
An investigation misdirected from the off, drowning in data, multiple pistes with inconclusive outcomes, currently adrift in a rolling swell. The bereaved left to twist in the wind.
They need to go back to the start.
Fook! Now I’m channeling NotForgettingFrenchBashing.
(Note to self – don’t post whilst watching Ghosts of Mars.)
Bacchus
Wow. The acquital on the receiving goods charge is proper in my view. What was the defence, not ‘good faith’ surely?
Who pays costs? Now that could be interesting…
The chancers shouldn’t have done it, but the charges were vindictive. EM should look closer to home.
I am none the wiser, I’ve looked at Le Dauphine libre and it is already behind a paywall, when was this court session?
The daily Liberation accused on Thursday the nuclear group Areva to have cheated the state by concealing information on the acquisition, for € 1.8 billion, the Canadian company Uramin. The uranium deposits in Africa this company acquired in 2007 all proved unworkable. The daily recalls confidential notes, internal mails, redacted reports, which, he says, all of which reveal the extent of a scandal that Areva officials have long sought to stifle. Including Anne Lauvergeon, head of the company at the time of acquisition of Uramin.
Also the heart of the matter Olivier Fric, the husband of Anne Lauvergeon. One that is as an “energy consultant” is suspected by Tracfin, the anti-money laundering service Bercy, tax fraud and money laundering have speculated on the acquisition of Uramin by Areva. During a search of the homes of two épous, the financial police would have got hold of dozens of documents – the most confidential – relating to this operation, says Libération. A note of Tracfin dated 31 July 2015, revealed by Charlie Hebdo, points to “atypical flow” on several accounts held by the husband of Anne Lauvergeon. “None found evidence to bring criminal jeopardize my client,” replies Mr. Mario Stasi, lawyer Olivier Fric. For his part, lawyer Anne Lauvergeon, Jean-Pierre Versini-Campinchi will probably continue Libération: “It is defamatory, he says. If it’s written like this, they will have to come to explain to the court, produce the documents and testimony that allow them to say what they have written. ”
AREVA is now in disarray. Virtually bankrupt public company forced the taxpayer to a massive bailout. The nuclear group needs nearly $ 5 billion in fresh capital. In the past five years, Areva has accumulated more than 8 billion euros of losses and recorded more than 9.5 billion euros of provisions and impairment.
The bill will now worsen with the 2015 accounts and perhaps even then, because of the disastrous contract for construction of the Olkiluoto EPR reactor in Finland. The company is bloodless, subject to a restructuring plan affecting 6,000 employees including about 3500 in France, and will soon be dismantled – with the sale of its business to EDF reactors 2.5 billion.
http://www.lefigaro.fr/societes/2016/02/11/20005-20160211ARTFIG00052-areva-aurait-cache-des-informations-a-l-etat-lors-du-rachat-d-uramin.php
I think that the court’s decision may have something to do with the lousy quality and the weird cropping of those photos
http://www.lalibre.be/actu/international/tuerie-de-chevaline-les-photos-du-carnage-5304714735704ec4c3a73f69
They look like poor-quality photos taken off a computer screen with a mobile phone, and that is indeed the safest method of leaking such data (avoiding treacherous EXIF data embedded in the original photos as well as avoiding log file entries indicating that the original photos were copied or printed out). If that be the case, a wide range of people could have taken those snaps, including cleaning staff and others not bound by a professional oath of secrecy – anybody with physical access to the office of anybody involved in the investigation.
@ Good In Parts, 10 Feb, 2016 – 11:12 pm
ZAH’s French lawyers have access to the investigation files, and you don’t hear him complaining about any obvious pistes that the gendarmerie have failed to investigate fully.
I thought the case was to have returned on 27/02/2016
so has it been brought forward or is this court of appeal something else?
They still seem to be sticking to this thesis though:
“Sylvain Mollier, probable collateral victim, was also killed.”
Peter
Good point, well made.
Although his lawyers were late to the table, by now they should have a reasonable overview of the file. All obvious pistes will certainly appear to have been investigated ‘fully’ when measured by file metrics such as time spent, reports generated etc.
As I said, I think they are ‘drowning in data’ that they have been unable to assimilate.
An example would be the laser scanning carried out at the scene. Has it ben fully exploited or is it languishing on a hard disk in Paris? Do the provincial gendarmerie even have remote access, not to mention suitable software and trained analysts?
In the UK an investigation of this size would use major incident software such as HOLMES 2 to manage the deluge of information.
I think the investigation was misdirected from the start and that the basics were not done properly because their focus was elsewhere. By ‘basics’ I mean ‘who what where why’ for every person and vehicle in the combe and surrounding villages for plus/minus two hours of time zero.
Peter, this was my observation, mobile phone snapshot of a screen, why not someone who was floating about !
GIP, with regard to the Scanning Equipment, the link I posted earlier says the experts were there.
“Très rapidement, une équipe d’experts de la police technique et scientifique a été dépêchée sur les lieux pour capturer sous forme numérique la scène de crime, collecter les des preuves et effectuer des prélèvements. Parmi eux, les agents de l’IRCGN, l’Institut de recherche criminelle de la gendarmerie nationale. L’équipe d’experts qui est équipée du scanner FARO depuis plusieurs années déjà, a utilisé le Focus3D pour capturer la scène de crime et déterminer les trajectoires balistiques.”
MN, it was stated in the Press articles that yesterday was the day, that is why I wrote to watch the media reports from the 10th. So, the family must be disappointed as will be Maillaud.
GIP, here is one quote from Vinneman, did Maillaud say the same ?
“”Il est potentiellement l’auteur [de la tuerie] mais il est surtout un témoin.” C’est en ces termes que le lieutenant-colonel Vinnemann parle du motard recherché dans le cadre de l’enquête sur le quadruple meurtre de Chevaline. Le portrait-robot de cet homme, portant un bouc et un casque foncé, peut-être même noir, a été diffusé ce lundi après-midi dans le cadre d’un appel à témoins.”
“It is potentially the author [of the massacre] but it is above all a witness.” It is in these terms that Lieutenant Colonel Vinnemann speak of Biker sought in connection with the investigation of the quadruple murder of Chevaline. The sketch of the man, wearing a goatee and a dark helmet, possibly black, aired on Monday afternoon as part of an appeal for witnesses. ”
M
it is possible that the reasoning behind
not giving a name to the mysterious motorcyclist
who was apparently eXactly in the right place at the right time,
is not just to save the face of this
local entrepreneur / motorcyclist / mystery person / parapentiste
is he may have been a witness
and has spilled his beans to the proc.
There is still the eldest child of the al-Hilli family who is
a witness.
If the eldest child of the al-Hilli family
has given a description of the bad man to the police artists,
it would be interesting to know
if the likeness is the same as the E-FIT-SKETCH given out a few years ago.
M.
Yes. Yes they were.
With ‘were’ being the operative word here. Experienced laser scanner techies from IRCGN were brought in, did their job, then went back to Paris. The analysis of the point cloud was carried out by the same group.
A summary and some powerpoints would doubtless be sent to the proc and the provincial gendarmerie. . . then what?
My guess is that the data are languishing on a hard disk in Paris. I also guess that the provincial gendarmerie even if they have remote access, do not have suitable software and trained analysts available for further refinement.
There is probably some kind of organisational behaviour ‘issue’ going on here. The locals see the Paris elite fly in, do their sheet, plonk down their report and disappear.
The locals don’t ‘own’ the data and cannot deal with it. Even if they could, who is going to second guess Paris? The Parisiens, well, they think they have done their bit for the hayseeds.
Is there anything worthwhile to be had by further analysis?
Maybe not, but the ‘premature abandonment’ of the crime scene was predicated on the idea that they had gotten the best possible picture of the scene. To then not look at it, seems negligent.
Personally, I don’t think the laser scanner resolution was sufficient, but if they made multiple scans it might be possible to resolve for example footprints in the gravel or particularly the verge, that would not be visible to the human eye.
Shoe type and size plus gait length could be useful. In combination with the ballistic analysis, height could be derived.
The picture taken by the mystery photographer needs more attention. Is the height of the photographer the same as the shooter?
LMC was supposed to be ‘hefty’ if not corpulent. If this desciption is accurate I cannot see him lightfooting it around le Martinet parking in his size 9’s without leaving a trace.
Not that I think he was the shooter but definitively excluding him could be useful.
Seven masked men mostly from Calais have been arrested by French police on suspicion of attacking Iraqi Kurds with iron bars in a nearby refugee camp. The victims were reportedly waiting by the road to board trucks traveling to the UK.
https://www.rt.com/news/332237-migrants-beaten-calais-arrests/
M
does that mean that BFMTV ( and others) are completely exonerated from any crime in relationship to the Slaughter of the Horses events?
Le Dauphine Libre ( I only saw one line as it was instantly behind a paywall)
I wonder if this recent court of appeal descision means that the press can now write what they want about Sylvain Mollier, get down to some proper invesigative journalizim
rather than pathetically waiting for crumbs of disinformation to fall from the mouths of the procs?
@ Good In Parts, 11 Feb, 2016 – 10:42 pm
One should not underestimate the local gendarmerie. I am quite confident that they possess much more information on the crime scene and the killer than they have chosen to reveal. Likewise, I am sure that analysing the “point cloud” generated by the 3D laser scanner was not a quick job conducted entirely by the IRCGN boys from Paris. Tasks such as populating the 3D crime scene data with bullet trajectories, footprints and anthropomorphic models of the victim(s) and perpetrator(s) and working out firing angles and the probable position and height of the perpetrator are often farmed out to private contractors. Given the immense pressure upon the gendarmerie to solve this case, I don’t think that they will have stinted upon the analysis. Top experts, probably including UK experts, will have extracted every last scrap of information from the available data – so far to no avail, unfortunately.
Anyway, I agree that the killer is probably a Frenchman, albeit not necessarily a local. That tells us something about his lifestyle, because another thing that the cops have not revealed is that they must have been inundated with hundreds or even thousands of tip-offs. Women ratting out their ex-boyfriends, concerned citizens denouncing their noisy neighbours, amateur sleuths who have solved the case on their own, clairvoyants, lunatics, self-accusers, jailbirds seeking favours – hundreds and hundreds of men in the general area of Chevaline must have been accused of being the killer by such types. All those tip-offs will have been followed up on. To my mind, that circumstance makes it quite unlikely that the killer is a local, or if he is, he must be a complete recluse. However, I believe that it is more likely that he is an itinerant, who probably passes through the area quite regularly (as evident from his good knowledge of the local geography), but does not live there permanently and does not have any strong social ties to local people.
Peter
I do not underestimate the local gendarmerie, I do not think that is actually possible for a start 😉
Snarkyness aside, I am sure that individually they are committed, competent and capable. They doubtless are also cohesive as a group, with excellent team spirit, at the department* level.
If I am even halfway right in my thinking, the level that the coherency breaks down is somewhere between Paris and the provinces.
If you think that they are not ‘drowning in data’ but too proud to ask for help from Paris, perhaps you would like to explain the length of time it took them to cross reference the cellular base station data with the national vehicle licencing database and the video camera evidence to identify LMC?
Contractors working on the case, sure why not, because they are not organisationally threatening but if you think that they will have asked for help from the UK and let those perfidious english loose on their precious raw data then… well you get the picture.
There is doubtless another major disconnect between the Haute Savoie and Surrey & Sussex. The enquiry is ‘joint’ in name only, but I don’t think that particular disconnect is holding things back.
This is an organisational behaviour issue. A traditionally structured provincial force hitting its first** complex major multinational case and being dragged kicking and screaming into the 20th century.
I contend that they have not extracted every last scrap of information from the available data. LMC took a long time to find. The relevant data sources were ‘local’ and available to them immediately. No transnational issues to deal with.
You say “3D crime scene data with bullet trajectories, footprints and anthropomorphic models”. I say ‘organisational data silo’ somewhere in Paris.
If EM had it to hand and could manipulate it, he would be waving it around on a large screen for his bessies in the press. Sure it would be an off-the-record briefing but you can be sure that we would have heard all about it by now.
(*) in this context ‘department’ in the french sense of the word, not ‘departmental’.
(**) financial or smuggling cases involving the canton next door are well inside their comfort zone.
Peter, by itinerant do you see the possibility of a serial killer (as opposed to mass murderer)?
Police usually do reveal a lot less than they know to the public.
What is so confounding is (my perception only) the length of time serial killers take to come to justice. Part of this seems to be due to moving around, or choosing victims that move around. This is a strategy some of them use to their advantage. Some serial killers do it as part of their job.