Chevaline Massacre: Luger Pistol Recovered from Lake Annecy Revives Investigation
A Luger-type pistol discovered by British tourists at the bottom of Lake Annecy could be the weapon used in the quadruple murder at Chevaline, committed in 2012 and still unsolved.
Luger at the Bottom of Lake Annecy, New Lead in the Chevaline Case
According to France Info, British tourists discovered a Luger-type pistol on 20 August lying at approximately two metres depth in Lake Annecy, in Haute-Savoie. The rare and antique weapon corresponds to the type of pistol used in the quadruple murder at Chevaline in September 2012 — a case which, fourteen years after the events, remains unsolved with no identified culprit. Verifications are underway.
On 5 September 2012, Saada Al-Hilli, a British man of Iraqi origin, his wife and his mother-in-law were found dead in their car, in the car park of a small mountain road overlooking Lake Annecy. All three had received multiple gunshot wounds to the head. A French cyclist, discovered at the foot of the vehicle, had also been shot dead. At the scene, investigators found several shell casings corresponding to a Luger, an emblematic weapon of the Second World War.
A Weapon Difficult to Trace
The correspondence between the recovered pistol and that of the killer remains to be established. The gendarmerie's scientific laboratory is to carry out an examination of the weapon shortly. But even if the identification proves positive, tracing it back to the owner promises to be complex.
Jean-Charles Antoine-Noirel, a former gendarmerie officer and arms trafficking specialist, explained to France Info: "This weapon could have circulated for several decades and been stored at a grandfather's house or at an owner's house or in a club, and then been stolen, sold illegally or given away. And that is where we see all the complexity of tracing a supply chain."
Local Residents Between Hope and Resignation
By the lakeside, on the morning of 1 September, residents of the area received the news with a mixture of expectation and scepticism. "I hope it will lead somewhere all the same, after all this time," one of them told France Info. Another summed up the general ambivalence: "It's just another episode now. Will we ever know or not, I don't know."
The investigation into the Chevaline massacre, one of the most media-covered criminal cases in France in recent decades, has never made it possible to identify a suspect. The discovery of the Luger in the lake constitutes, according to investigators, a potentially important lead — but whose real significance will depend on the results of the forthcoming ballistic examination.
Source: France Info