It was the most recent twist in a dramatic life trajectory depicted in a series co-produced by the BBC and Netflix called “The Serpent,” which aired last yr. He has previously admitted to killing Western tourists around Asia.
Sobhraj, a 78-year-old French citizen, had been serving time for the deaths of American and Canadian backpackers in Nepal in 1975, but was released Friday for health and other reasons.
He arrived Saturday at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris on a flight from Nepal via Qatar, his French lawyer, Isabelle Coutant-Peyre, told The Associated Press.
He’s glad to be free, she said, and “now he’ll rest.” She described him as an “optimist” and resilient.
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French filmmaker Jean-Charles Deniau, who spoke to Sobhraj upon his arrival in Paris and is releasing a movie and book about his life, said, “He’s doing well. He has medicines. He’ll live in Paris, and a bit of bit in every single place.”
The French government didn’t reply to requests for comment on whether he could face judicial challenges in France. Sobhraj was born in Vietnam during French rule and claims French citizenship.
He’s believed to have killed at the very least 20 people in Afghanistan, India, Thailand, Turkey, Nepal, Iran and Hong Kong between 1972 and 1982.
But despite multiple legal cases opened against him, judicial authorities across the region struggled to convict him for the killings — or to maintain him behind bars.
He was arrested in Recent Delhi in 1976 and accused of murdering two tourists and stealing their jewelry. He was convicted of the theft but acquitted of murder. In Thailand, he faced 14 murder charges. He avoided being extradited by staying before the courts in India until the Thai case expired in 1996. In Thailand, he faced the death penalty.
In 1986, he escaped from Recent Delhi’s maximum-security Tihar prison after luring guards into sharing a drug-laced birthday cake, but was later recaptured.
In 1997, he was deported from India to France, where he lived freely but was investigated for allegedly attempting to poison a bunch of French tourists in India.
He resurfaced in 2003 in a casino within the Nepalese city of Kathmandu, and was questioned concerning the unsolved murders of an American and a Canadian backpacker whose charred bodies were found on the town’s outskirts. He was convicted the next yr and handed a life sentence.
Sobhraj insisted on his innocence in that case, though had previously spoken of killing other tourists. When he was released from the Indian prison, he said he regretted points of his past.
Life sentences in Nepal are 20 years. In announcing his release this week, the Nepal Supreme Court said he has heart disease, and had already served greater than 75% of his sentence and had behaved well in prison, making him eligible for release.
He was freed Friday and ordered to go away Nepal inside 15 days. A friend helped finance a ticket to France, and the French Embassy prepared travel documents allowing him to go away, attorney Gopal Siwakoti Chitan said.
His French lawyer welcomed his release. “I’m very completely satisfied but very shocked that it took 19 years to acquire his normal freedom,” Coutant-Peyre said on the airport. She said his murder conviction in Nepal was a “fabricated case” and said the French government didn’t do enough to assist or defend him.
She said Sobhraj watched the series “The Serpent” and said it was “garbage initially, and that 70 percent of it is completely false.”
His “serpent” nickname stems from his popularity as a disguise and escape artist. He was also referred to as “the bikini killer” because he often targeted young women.
Binaj Gurubacharya in Kathmandu, Nepal, contributed.
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