Charles sobhraj trial#
He has never stood trial for the alleged murders in Thailand. Sobhraj, now in his mid-70s, has suffered health problems in recent years and is seeking to be released from jail. In 2014, he was also convicted of the 1975 murder of Laurent Carriere. In 2003, Sobhraj was arrested in a Kathmandu casino and later convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for the 1975 murder of Connie Bronzich. He lived in France, where he has citizenship. He was released from jail in 1997 after the warrant for his extradition to Thailand ran out. He was jailed for various charges and served 20 years, briefly escaping in 1986 after drugging the prison guards with poisoned sweets. These are some of the people Sobhraj is believed to have killed in 19.Ĭharles Sobhraj was arrested in 1976 for drugging a busload of French students in New Delhi, India. His spate of killings in Thailand became known as the "bikini murders" as some of his victims were found in their swimsuits, while he was also given the moniker "the serpent" for his ability to change his appearance and identity. The victims, often backpackers, would be befriended, drugged, then murdered by Sobhraj, who would steal any money they had and their passports to help him evade capture.
Charles sobhraj serial#
He also claimed Leclerc and his associate Ajay Chowdhury had carried out some of the murders, but the truth of these crimes will likely never be known. Charles Sobhraj, a French serial killer who police say is responsible for a series of murders in the 1970s and 1980s, has been released from prison in Nepal. In the book The Life And Crimes Of Charles Sobhraj, Sobhraj confessed to murdering five people in Thailand and two people in Nepal. ( AFP: Prakash Mathema)Ĭharles Sobhraj is believed to have murdered more than a dozen people, but the exact number is not known. That book and others have shaped the story of the killings, but the show was heavily influenced by the real-life experiences of Knippenberg, played by Billy Howle. The book was written by Australian journalists Julie Clarke and Richard Neville in 1979.Ĭlarke and Neville interviewed Sobhraj in prison in Delhi, India, after the rights to his life story were sold to publisher Random House. Rahim said he wanted to play Sobhraj, having read The Life And Crimes Of Charles Sobhraj when he was a teenager. Sobhraj is played by Tahar Rahim, who has the titular role in Jodie Foster and Benedict Cumberbatch's 2021 film The Mauritanian. The Serpent is inspired by real events and focuses on the pursuit of Charles Sobhraj and his girlfriend Marie-Andrée Leclerc by Dutch diplomat Herman Knippenberg in the late 1970s.
The series aired in the UK on New Year's Day and became BBC iPlayer's most popular new BBC program since the limited drama series, Normal People. The Serpent is available on Netflix from Friday, April 2 and is made up of eight episodes, each one hour long. Sobhraj, who befriended, drugged then murdered young Western backpackers in the 1970s, has this year achieved notoriety due to the popular limited series, The Serpent. He claimed that he had completed his jail term as per the 'concessions' entitled to senior citizens of Nepal.ĭistrict Court, Bhaktapur, had slapped him with a life sentence for the murder of American citizen Connie Jo Bronzich and Canadian citizen Laurent Carriere in December 1975.Charles Sobhraj isn't a name many would recognise, but just a few decades ago the serial killer and conman was one of Asia's most wanted criminals. Sobhraj, who has been serving a 19-year jail term on the charge of murders at the central jail, had filed habeas corpus petitions through his lawyer. The division bench passed the verdict, concluding that his claim was genuine.
Sobhraj had earlier filed an application claiming that he was put in prison for more than the period recommended for him on the murder charge. The French serial killer had filed a petition demanding exemption on his lifetime term on the ground of old age. On Wednesday, a bench of Justices Sapana Pradhan Malla and Til Prasad Shrestha ordered the government to release Sobhraj from jail stating he was in need of open heart surgery. He has been in Nepali jail on the charge of murdering two American tourists.
0 kommentar(er)
