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>

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

8,072 thoughts on “Not Forgetting the al-Hillis continued

1 81 82 83 84 85 233
  • Good In Parts

    Bacchus

    A Beretta 92 is a 9mm. However the ever reliable Wikipedia notes that about 5000 early 98F models were manufactured in .30 Luger.

    The Beretta 98 confusingly was chambered for 9×21 IMI and .30 Luger.

    I guess that you are refering to the G model, originally designed for the Gendarmerie Nationale and manufactured in france as the PAMAS G1 for the military.

    It does not look as if the 98G was ever manufactured chambered in .30 Luger. Looks like only the Beretta 98SB and Beretta 99 were.

    In any case, the use of a Luger must have been confirmed by extractor marks etc.

  • Peter

    @ Good in Parts
    If Saad married Iqbal the traditional way, they would have met for the first time on the day that they became engaged, then parted ways again until their marriage. The families might have shown them photos of each other, but they would not have directly communicated at all, not even via text message, before they became engaged. If Saad wanted to marry the kind of girl that his mother would have approved of, that’s the way in which it would have happened. Even if they were a little less strict about the etiquette, it would have been a matter of Saad flying out to the UAE, having a few awkward chaperoned meetings with his bride-to-be, and then getting engaged right away. Thus, Saad ended up with a “dentist” who didn’t really want to be a dentist, whereas she ended up with a “satellite engineer” who fixed old lawnmowers in order to supplement his income …

    It is true that the surveillance in Claygate started at around the same time as the second Iraq war, but, personally, I find it much more plausible that it had something to do with Iqbal’s arrival or imminent arrival. Alternatively, Saad might have written the wrong things about the war in the wrong kind of Internet forums. That, too, could have sufficed for him to be given that kind of heavy-handed warning.

    @ Shelock
    JT is said by some to have been associated with an outlaw motorcycle gang. Terms like “associated” can cover a multitude of sins, but if he actually was one of them, a full member, he would have been in the unique position of being able to command acts of violence anywhere in the world, free of charge. What happened at the Martinet seems too excessive for it to be possibly related to a fleeting relationship more than a decade ago, but it is worth bearing in mind that JT, if he really was a 1%er, could have had Saad’s legs broken any time he felt like it.

  • Pink

    LOL I can’t believe you said that if you think that’s bad you would have a shock at how the rest of us are trying to survive .

    Peter said :
    “finding herself in a crumbling house in a provincial backwater, living on a shoestring budget,”

  • michael norton

    If a different “organization” was paying for the brief of Sylvain
    to the employer who granted him three years paternity leave,

    would that just mean he had recently changed employers
    or could it be thought of as a little more involved?

  • michael norton

    There was only a short period of time between Sylvain being granted leave
    and his murder.
    It would be difficult to get a new job in such a short time and fit in with baby care.

  • Good In Parts

    Pink

    Just a thought about a possible “need to disguise his death” as you put it.

    Chevaline is a (relatively) short distance from an international border. One can be out of the country toot sweet.

    Freedom of movement within the Schengen area without a unified policing system makes hot persuit difficult. How are you going to shut down Geneva airport for instance?

    Now I haven’t checked where Jimmy died but it could easily be the same sort of distance to the county line. Get to a regional hub, hop on a plane and . . . . you are still in US airspace.

    If he were killed by someone from outside the US they would need time to effect an escape.

  • Pink

    It still strikes me as complicated he died in his vehicle on a street,if someone wanted to buy time it would make more sense to do it where he wouldn’t be found,unless someone proves he was murdered I am unconvinced,on the other hand dying on the same day looks very suspicious.
    Shelock’s idea of wanting to flee with JT’s help might work,any port in a storm so to speak, it does get a bit too complicated for me ,was SAH in or out? ,perhaps Iqbal was meant to jump on the back of the bike and head for the hills she didn’t look dressed for it though .

  • Bacchus

    VERY GOOD !

    take a look at TCK deadzone

    2h
    FBleu Pays de Savoie @bleusavoie
    #TUERIE DE #CHEVALINE | La sœur du légionnaire d’#Ugine mis en cause dans un livre sera notre invitée de la rédaction ce mardi à 7h50

  • michael norton

    Quote Le Dauphine Libre
    “My brother was balanced, serene. I am sure he is not the author of the slaughter of Chevaline. Besides, that day, it was with my son. It’s too easy to talk on the back of a man who is no longer here to defend himself. ”

    In an exclusive interview with our colleague from France Bleu Pays de Savoie Richard Vivion and circulated Tuesday morning, Christelle Menegaldo, sister of the former legionnaire who had committed suicide in July 2014 Ugine , wants to rehabilitate the memory his brother, described as the No. 1 suspect in the book “the perfect crime” of British journalist Tom Parry.
    “My act is not an admission” wrote the former military, before killing himself

    “He knew Sylvain (NDLR- Mollier, one of the four victims of the killings), but the two men got along well. This is her hearing by the gendarmes who broke the thread that held him … she believes. I hope that we find an answer, the truth and that his honor is washed … “concluded his sister, who admits that the family now lives under the weight of looks accusers in Ugine.

    In the same interview with our colleague, the lawyer of the family, Jean-Pierre Lepetit, reads an excerpt from the letter found next to the remains of Patrice Menegaldo: “I know nothing of this whole story. And my gesture is not a confession. It’s my way of defending the mine despite the pain and grief that will touch us. ”

    Find all our articles on the Slaughter of Chevaline .

    By Stéphane Bouchet | Published on 23.06.2015 at 06:10 | Updated there are about 1 hour

  • michael norton

    HAUTE-SAVOIE/SAVOIE Tuerie de Chevaline : la sœur de l’ex-légionnaire d’Ugine sort du silence

    I wonder what NDLR means?
    (NDLR- Mollier, l’une des quatre victimes de la tuerie)
    http://www.ledauphine.com/haute-savoie/2015/06/23/la-soeur-de-l-ex-legionnaire-d-ugine-sort-du-silence

    picture of presumably the appartment block of Patrice Mengaldo

    Le 3 juin 2014, Patrice Menegaldo, 50 ans, était retrouvé mort à son domicile. vant son suicide, il avait pris le soin de laisser des lettres à son entourage et une à côté de son corps pour expliquer son geste, toutes mentionnant la tuerie de Chevaline.Archives photo Le DL/Philippe SENAT

  • Bacchus

    “Autre son de cloche du côté de la famille Menegaldo. Elle certifie que Patrice a été placé en garde à vue. Un moment qu’il aurait “très mal supporté” selon sa sœur. Dans sa lettre, il lui raconte qu’il a été mal traité et humilié par un gendarme en particulier. “Durant cet interrogatoire on a du casser le fil qui le retenait”

  • Good In Parts

    Pink

    You wrote:-

    I was thinking along the lines of what if he had passed on info that triggered the shooting

    Would there be any connections between the Maestros and JT family that would bring a whole new angle if Iqbal was communicating with JT?

    Do you have any thoughts as to who JT could have passed info to, if it was not the Maestros? Or was your scenario Maestro specific?

  • Bacchus

    If Patrice had admitted in his letter, that would mean that his sister’s son was involved …

    Elementary my dear Watson …

  • Good In Parts

    Peter

    Thanks for the insight into marriage ‘the traditional way’.

    On surveillance, I remember that early press reports noted that SAH had been of interest to the security services for around 20 years (which would take us back to the first gulf war).

    This seemed to be distinct from the statements by the neighbour.

  • michael norton

    I wonder if the sister of Patrice Menegaldo would know if Sylvain Mollier worked
    ( as we have always understood) at Cezus-Areva
    or as we are now expected to believe, elsewhere?

  • michael norton

    Next question is
    when will the slaughterers of Nicole Communal-Tournier be in court,
    it is a year since these “locals” were rounded up by the authorities.

    Remembering that Eric Maillaud said he had not ruled out that the slaughter of Nicole
    may be connected to
    the Slaughter of the Horses.

  • Peter

    I am sorry to say that PM’s final letters do not sound like those of an an innocent man to me. Rather, they sound like the words of a man who wants to protect his relatives from the consequences of what he has done. (Think about it: if he had confessed to the murders in his final letters, there is no way any member of his family could have continued to live in the region. More than that, given the intense emotions that this case has stirred all over the world, his relatives would need to be given new identities and be taken into some kind of witness protection programme.) Moreover, they don’t sound as if he considered the whole affair to be over: “(…) la douleur et le chagrin qui va nous toucher.”

    Apparently, he was interviewed as a suspect and his alibi hinges upon his having been with his sister’s son on the day. If we have to rely solely upon the word of the sister’s son for confirmation – which I don’t know, the two of them could have been seen together by dozens of witnesses – that would not be a particularly strong alibi. As Bacchus has pointed out, his final letters might also serve to exculpate his sister’s son of providing a false alibi.

    Speculating, perhaps the gendarmes who interrogated him told him that, although they could not prove it yet, they knew that he was their man and that they would keep tabs upon him until they could prove it. Perhaps they did keep tabs upon him and let him know about it, harassed him. That would have caused sufficient stress eventually for him to crack.

  • Peter

    PS: This phrase “Je ne sais rien de toute cette histoire.  Et mon geste n’est pas un aveu.” sounds curiously formal. It is almost as if he had wanted to give his relatives official testimony that they could show to anybody who might consider him guilty and therefore make their lives a misery.

  • Mr Juicy

    I’d recommend listening to the whole interview in French, rather than relying on edited versions in the French print media, let alone machine translated or regurgitated versions in English.

    The real significance of this interview is the chasm which separates Christelle Menegaldo’s account from the version given to Parry by Maillaud. It’s impossible to reconcile her words with the claim by Maillaud that this was a 45 minute “polite interview” of a witness.

    Thus, if true, the statement by Christelle, while bravely asserting her brother’s innocence, confirms that he was indeed “un vrai suspect.” (Maillaud’s words, quoted by Parry in the book).

    She states (apparently quoting from the suicide note) that:

    a. Patrice a été placé en garde à vue. (Placed in custody);
    b. Il a été mal traité et humilié par un gendarme en particulier. (Aggressively interrogated.)
    c. “Durant cet interrogatoire on a du casser le fil qui le retenait.” (This “snapped the thread.”)

    Asked to comment on the interrogation (and not quoting from the letter) she suggests that:

    d. Il y’avait en face quelqu’un qui cherchait quelque chose… (The person asking the questions was looking for something..)

    Such treatment would only have been meted out to a real suspect, not a routine witness.

    So either Patrice must have grossly exaggerated what had happened in those 45 minutes (or longer), or Maillaud is covering up the truth of what happened in the “interview” with Menegaldo. Which version is correct? I’d go with the latter.

    Christelle Menegaldo describes her late brother as équilibré, whereas Maillaud tells Parry that the man suffered psychological problems. Again, the two versions cannot both be correct.

    Christelle believes that the aggressive and humiliating interrogation of Patrice pushed him over the edge. Given that she considers him to be “équilibré” it must have been an extremely unpleasant experience to have had such a dramatic effect on his state of mind. On the other hand, if Maillaud is being truthful, and the interview was polite and gentle, then there is no credible explanation for the suicide, other than the one I suggested in an earlier post. (Christelle herself rejects the idea that her brother was in some way traumatized by his experience as a legionnaire.)

    On several occasions, the interviewer puts words into the mouth of Christelle by the way he frames his questions. This is perhaps not unreasonable: he is guiding someone who is probably nervous and not used to being interviewed. But he also states that it was “le journaliste anglais” who pointed to Menegaldo as “le suspect numéro un.” This is not true: Parry does not use that phrase in the book. It was Maillaud who introduced the phrase “suspect numéro un” in his subsequent denial statement. In the book, Parry merely quotes Maillaud as saying “un vrai suspect” – a term which Christelle’s account of the interrogation bears out fully.

    It’s also worth noting that in addition to mentioning the previous relationship between Patrice and Sylvain’s sister, she refers to “des rapports sur d’autres angles” between Patrice and Sylvain. It would be interesting to know what other angles she is referring to. She says that there were no other “soucis” (cares, worries) between them, but qualifies it by saying “à ma connaissance” (as far as she is aware).

    From Christelle ‘s voice and expression in the interview, it seems to me that she speaks with confidence when quoting from the suicide note, which she has in front of her, and about her wish to wash her brother’s honour, but with a lesser degree of confidence when asked about other aspects of the case.

    Finally, as Peter has noted, Patrice apparently has an alibi: she claims that her brother was with her son at the time of the killing (Christelle herself cannot vouch for him because she was out at work.) But if this alibi was completely watertight, it is inconceivable that he would have been subjected to such an aggressive interrogation (if we are to believe her version). Therefore we must assume that the French investigators were not fully convinced by this alibi. I agree with the view that Patrice’s suicide was a way of protecting the family and Christelle’s son.

    It’s interesting that Christelle speaks of Patrice’s “honour”. This is evidently a motif that is important to his family and which runs through his life (and death). Hence my view that the killing of Sylvain was “honour” related, and that Patrice’s suicide was also motivated by considerations of “honour”.

1 81 82 83 84 85 233