NEPAL: On Wednesday, the Supreme Court of Nepal ordered the release of notorious French serial killer Charles Sobhraj on the grounds of his advanced age.
The Supreme Court decided that Sobhraj, 78, who has been detained in the Himalayan Republic since 2003 for the murder of two foreign tourists, should be released on medical leave.
“Keeping him in prison continuously is not in line with the prisoner’s human rights,” a copy of the ruling reads. The Supreme Court also ordered to deport the French serial killer within 15 days of his parole.
“He’ll be sent back in 15 days. They will transfer him from the jail to the immigration office, which will be a cell, from there. His deportation is being processed, but he could leave much sooner,” said Lok Bhakt Rana, Sobhraj’s attorney.
His method of operation was to charm and befriend his victims—many of whom were starry-eyed Western tourists seeking spirituality—before drugging, stealing, and killing them.
Charles Sobhraj and his series of serial killing
Sobhraj, a Frenchman with Indian and Vietnamese ancestry, was accused of killing two travellers in 1975—US citizen Connie Jo Boronzich, 29, and his Canadian partner Laurent Carrière, 26—by entering Nepal with a fraudulent passport.
He was detained in India in 1976, following the death of a foreign visitor from poisoning at a hotel in Delhi, and was given a 12-year prison term for murder.
Sobhraj ultimately served 21 years in prison, with a brief respite in 1986, during which he managed to escape and was apprehended in the Indian coastal state of Goa.
After being freed in 1997, Sobhraj retired to Paris but later returned to Nepal, where he was apprehended after being seen in the tourist area of Kathmandu.
On September 1, 2003, he was located outside a casino in Nepal after his picture was published in a newspaper. The police charged him with two separate murders after his detention, accusing him of killing the couple in 1975 in Kathmandu and Bhaktapur.
Eventually, he was connected to more than 20 murders. He frequently used the male victims’ passports to leave for his next location after strangling, beating, or burning them.
Sobhraj married Nihita Biswas, the Nepalese lawyer’s daughter, 44 years his junior, in 2008 while he was still a prisoner.
The French serial killer Sobhraj, who carried out a series of homicides, is portrayed in the Netflix series “The Serpent.” The title of the series is also a nickname for Sobhraj, which comes from his capacity to adopt different identities in order to elude justice.
Earlier in 2010, the Supreme Court of Nepal backed the life sentence given to the French killer by the Kathmandu District Court. But now, seeing the condition of his health, it has revised its decision.
Shobhraj, 75, is being treated for a heart condition, according to the court, and has already completed 75% of his sentence (19 years).
Earlier, Sobhraj had collapsed in a special cell at the Kathmandu Central Jail. Following the initial examination, he was directed to a hospital where the mitral valve leakage was indicated to be surgically repaired. He underwent an open heart procedure there.
Also Read: Earthquake of 5.5 Magnitude Hits Nepal
