Timesuck with Dan Cummins - 521 - The Serpent: Serial Killer Charles Sobhraj

Episode Date: August 24, 2026

Long before Catch Me If You Can made Frank Abagnale famous, another master con man was crisscrossing the globe under countless stolen identities and leaving a trail of bodies behind him.  Charles Sobhraj, “The Serpent,” was a charismatic thief, fraudster, prison escape artist, and serial killer who preyed on travelers across Asia while repeatedly slipping through the fingers of law enforcement. His story is so crazy it feels less like real life, and more like a movie.  Merch and more: www.badmagicproductions.com  Timesuck Discord! https://discord.gg/tqzH89v Want to join the Cult of the Curious PrivateFacebook Group? Go directly to Facebook and search for "Cult of the Curious" to locate whatever happens to be our most current page :) For all merch-related questions/problems: [e-mail] (copy and paste) Please rate and subscribe on Apple Podcasts and elsewhere and follow the suck on social media!! @timesuckpodcast on IG and http://www.facebook.com/timesuckpodcast Wanna become a Space Lizard? Click here: https://www.patreon.com/timesuckpodcast. Sign up through Patreon, and for $5 a month, you get access to the entire Secret Suck catalog (295 episodes) PLUS the entire catalog of Timesuck, AD FREE. You'll also get 20% off of all regular Timesuck merch PLUS access to exclusive Space Lizard merch. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Do you remember the 2002 film Catch Me If You Can? If you don't, it's the allegedly true story of Frank Abagnale Jr.'s criminal escapades during the 1960s. Abagnale is a legendary con man. Some have described him as arguably the greatest con man of all time. Starting in his teens, he successfully performed cons that in total made him millions of dollars by doing stuff like posing as a Pan American World Airways pilots, Georgia Doctor, and a Louisiana parish prosecutor. He successfully forged hundreds, if not thousands of documents. and checks traveled extensively and luxuriously and for a time evaded law enforcement, or did he?

Perhaps Frank's greatest con was convincing enough people that he was a good enough con man through a bullshit autobiography for his supposed life to be made into a huge Hollywood movie. That's what's something. Journalists have never found any evidence to back up the majority of his biggest claims. Today, though, we are going to be talking about another con man who operated during the same time as Abagnale someone who also started young, someone who used many, many different identities, forged countless documents, traveled extensively and luxuriously, pulled off a crazy amount of crimes, kept roping more and more people into his crimes, including a line of beautiful women who adored him

and who also evaded law enforcement over and over and over again. His story way crazier than Franks. And unlike Frank, there is a lot of evidence that our subject did what he said he did, including leaving enough dead bodies in his wake to get himself classified as a serial killer. He terrorized large parts of Asia and Europe in the 1960s and 70s, and his snake-like ability to evade capture earned him the moniker of the serpent. This week, the life and many, many crimes of the serpent, the French fraudster, thief, and charming serial killer Charles Sobraj, but really the man of many, many names

on another true crime international edition of Time Suck. This is Michael McDonald, and you're listening to TimeSuck. You're listening to TimeSuck. Happy Monday, and welcome or welcome back to the cult of the curious. I'm Dan Cummins, the suckmaster, guy who now says, okay, too much, okay? Hopeful literary child of the mother of Frankenstein, so I guess also hopeful Monster Brother, and you are listening to TimeSuck. Hail Nimrod, Hail Lucifina, praise be to Good Boy, Bojangles, and Glory B to Triple M.

recording this on August 6th, and my heart goes out to a lot of my neighbors in Spokane, Washington, just a 30-minute drive away. My former home for many years were wildfires that have covered us here in CDA in a cloud of smoke still rage. As of this moment, it has been reported that over 900 structures, most of those being homes, have burned to the ground. Tens of thousands of people are currently displaced, the most destructive cluster of fires in state history. in terms of structural damage. And they are still burning at this moment, with temperatures expected to rise and a fear of winds picking up.

Hopefully this is all over and has been over for a while by the time you hear this, and hopefully a lot of aid has already been given to those in need. We will be donating to those affected in the Spokane area wildfires from Bad Magic this next month in September. Now let me tell you about a different kind of destruction, one just as unnecessary as the Spokane fires

that some asshole has already confessed to helping start at least one of the fires due to arson. Cool, fuckface, cool. Before we jump into the timeline, beginning in April of 1975, which will take us a little while to get there, to talk about Charles Srebrogh's most infamous crimes, will first take a look at the world he was born into.

And his childhood to help us understand why he did what he did and how he was able to avoid detection for as long as he was. Given the messy record-keeping that occurred during the end of the colonial powers, the actual dates to Charles' youthful mayhem are pretty blurry, but the details of what happened, you know, more important than exactly when they happened anyway. Charles was born in Saigon on April 6, 1944 when it was part of French Indochina.

And French Indochina was a group of French dependent territories in Southeast Asia, existing under that name from 1887 to 1954. Starting in the 1850s, France began to use the persecution of French missionaries as an excuse to explain. ban their colonial empire into Vietnam. Classic false flag operation. The persecutor playing the victim. That is a strategy that has worked so well for so many, unfortunately, bitching about how everybody is out to get you while you are consistently taking everybody's shit. In 1859, French troops destroyed the citadel of Janin skirmishes, continued until 1861

in the population of the city that would be known as Saigon before its name would change again to Hocheemen City, a city with over 14,000. million people today fell back then from 40,000 to around 8,000 as residents fled the fighting. It was barely left a town at all. After France forced the Wyn Emperor to sign over control of Vietnam, the colonialists embarked on an ambitious building spree in Saigon, using Vietnamese slave and convict labor to fill canals, pave wide boulevards, build elegant government and residential buildings, even erect a European-style cathedral. It is fucking crazy.

I was just talking about this with somebody else before this episode came in. long recently. It's crazy to think about that when you travel around the world, how many of the old beautiful historical sites you see were literally built with slave labor. The only way it was cost-effective to ever make such opulent structures. Makes me think of that phrase when people complain about how we don't build comparatively magnificent building anymore. Just they don't build them like they used to. Yeah, for good fucking reason. The colonists created a segregated world inside of Saigon, made a cozy little bubble for themselves. Inside of it, it felt more like a neighborhood in Paris than part of Asia at that time.

In Saigon at the turn of the 20th century, you can find French soldiers, French businessmen, officials, and their wives shopping for the latest Parisian fashions at upscale boutiques along Rue Katanat, gathering for cocktails at the French Colonial Club, the place to be seen and see others. Sokol Sportif, reading week old editions of the popular French newspaper, a Lamonde on the veranda of the bougie continental hotel. The colonists insulated themselves as much as possible from the poverty of the rest of the quickly growing cities 100,000 or so inhabitants. Saigon was a city that told a tale of two very different worlds. It was the capital city of French Indochina, and French Indochina was comprised of Cambodia, Laos, started in 1890,

Guangzhouan from 1898 to 1945, which was a territory leased to France by China. Cochin, China, what is now the southern tip of Vietnam, and the land that is now the Vietnamese regions of Tonkin and Onam. Much like other colonized localities in the 20th century, the French exploited the resources of this region during their rule brutally, while also contributing to limited and uneven improvements of the health and education system of the region designed only to benefit the French, a tiny group of native elites instead of the local native population as a whole. And this, as it always has and always will, led to tensions. Led to a deep divide between the colonists and the native people and a bunch of small rebellions and fights broke out during the French control of the region, like rebellions always do when you oppress the local population to the point that many of them feel like their lives are so fucking shitty.

They're willing to risk them to try and create a better world for themselves to live in. World War I then shook things up further for the natives living in French, into China, when nearly 100,000 Vietnamese. were conscripted to fight for their oppressors and were sent off to Europe to fight for a war that would not benefit them in any fucking way. They would serve on the French battlefield or work as laborers for the French soldiers. By conscripting French Indochinese people, most of whom were Vietnamese, France also gave them the unique opportunity of direct access to the social life and the political debates that were occurring in contemporary France. They got to see for the first time, you know, the world that the colonizers came from.

and this cultural exchange would eventually backfire on France. It resulted in more French Indochinese, aspiring to become masters of their own destiny. Returning to a colonial occupation of their own country by a ruler that many of them had fought and died for in a war they did not ask for, resulted in increased dissatisfaction, of course, with colonial rule following the war. And now, a lot of dudes, newly trained in the art of killing other dudes, sought out and joined a Vietnamese nationalist movement focused on over-thirstyles. throwing the French. Tensions in Saigon were growing higher and higher in the two decades before Charles

Slebrage was born. The city was increasingly the scene of civil unrest as communist labor unions protested French exploitation of workers. The ICP was founded in 1930 by Ho Chi Minh and others who saw Marxism as the only hope for salvation. They began to plot the end of colonialism in Vietnam. Fucking crazy. That's where the insane clown posse comes from, right? Did you know the ICP was founded in 1930? In Vietnam? I didn't. Wow.

Yeah, Vietnamese hip-hoppy ditty brinks. Wait a minute. No, I forgot. Sometimes that two organizations can share the same acronym. talking about a different ICP today, of course. The Indo-Chinese Communist Party. Way less drugs. Less dancy.

The revolution was slow. I'm an idiot. The revolution was slow to develop, and by the start of World War II, French Indochina was being slowly chipped away at through internal rebellions and other nations such as Japan vying to take control of the region. You know, they have their own ambitions.

When Nazi Germany conquered France in 1940, the citizens of Saigon suddenly found themselves answering to new colonial masters. Way less cool. Not that the French were nice to him, but Nazis worse. Then Japan took over governing Indochina for the duration of World War II, throwing French troops into jail and garrisoning thousands of soldiers and converted schools and other buildings, Saigon.

Japanese also not nice masters. Any hopes the Japanese would be more sympathetic occupiers very quickly dashed? They were fucking brutal and terrorized and looted the countryside. 1954, the year that Charles Sobrage was born was objectively not a good time to be Indo-Chinese and living in Saigon. The U.S. and other allied nations bombed roadways and other infrastructural targets to cut off supplies to Saigon

and attempt to weaken the access powers, controlling the region, supplies being cut off, the history of mismanaged resources by the French government to fund the war and flooding in northern French into China on top of everything else created the perfect storm

for a man-made famine. Fun! That swept through Vietnam in 1944-1945. The exact number of deaths caused by this famine is unknown and a matter of controversy and debate, but between 400,000, 2 million people starved in northern Vietnam during that time. God damn, that's a lot of people.

So many lives. It is unfathomable to properly, emotionally comprehend. How many others damn near starved as well? I always think about that with famines. Right, of like 2 million people starved to death. How many million other people almost starved to death? Oof. It was here in the capital city under this environment

during the start of the famine that Charles Sobrage's parents will meet. Let's meet them now before properly jumping into the timeline a little while later. Actually, quite a while later. Chun Wang Feng was a native of French into China, born into a rural village, excuse me, not too far from Saigon.

And in the early 1940s, when she was just 15, she moved on her own, left home to go to Saigon for better life. By better life, I mean, you know, hopefully not starve or live in just abject poverty forever. She initially found a job, washing melons, not a creepy euphemism. For a merchant who sold fruit to restaurants,

she was one of roughly a thousand women who worked in the open-air fruit and vegetable markets in Saigon, doing shit like shining up the produce. There, Chun, of course, met new people. One of those people helped her get a new job at a restaurant as a host slash waitress. It helped that Chun was said to be exceptionally pretty. Her boss made it very clear, though, that she was not to flirt,

not to date, the restaurant patrons. And for over a year, Chun dodged numerous boys and men flirting with her. But then one day, a regular customer caught Chun's eye, a quiet man who always kept to himself when he paid his bills. He never spoke other than to murmur thank you and broken Vietnamese with a smile. Chun knew the man was a foreigner. She assumed he was French, but when she addressed him in the new French words, she was learning from customers, he didn't appear to understand what he was saying. Then one evening when he paid his bill, he thrust this package towards Chun, like a little gift, hurried away, seemingly embarrassed.

the package contained an exquisite gown and a note, painstakingly printed in French, asking her if she would like to go for a boat ride with him on the Dongnai River. When he returned the next night and took his customary table without even daring to look at her, Chun now sent a note over to him. Thank you so much at red, and also, yes.

And then, dude let out a literal yip of joy, like a squeal, heard around the restaurant. Seems sweet right now. Seems cute. But was he? This mystery customer's name was Sobrage Hachard Banani. Sobrage was an Indian immigrant in his early 40s who grew up in a town near Bombay. He was a tailor who lived and worked in a one-room apartment in Saigon. The machine on which he sewed was an old one, operated by foot pedal, but from it emerged dress whites for officers and soft pretty blouses for the women.

Sobrage, neither Vietnamese nor French, which is important to note, as French Indochina in 1944 was a society, organized around rigid racial and national classifications that determined every aspect of one's existence from where one could live to what work one could do to whom one could marry. At the very top of the social pyramid was the French colonial administrators and military officers. These people governed through a combination of direct control

and collaboration with local elites. And the next rung down, other Europeans, just not in the government or the military, and then below them that tiny slice of local elites, elites, and then finally near the bottom of this pyramid was the largest group, and this was the Vietnamese, Cambodian, and Laotian people who made up the vast majority of the population. Sabrage didn't fit cleanly into any of these groups. Indian immigrants occupied an ambiguous kind of middle position in this hierarchy.

They were Asian rather than European. They also, though, came from a part of the British Empire and often served colonial administrations as merchants, moneylenders, or skilled craftsmen. they were neither colonizers nor quite colonized in the same ways the locals in Indochina existing in this liminal space that granted them certain economic opportunities while still marking them as fundamentally different from and inferior to Europeans. Aren't we a silly species chopping shit up like this? It's almost like it doesn't have to be this way and it never has because it doesn't and it hasn't.

Some people apparently just can't have fun unless they're fun and their privilege comes to somebody else's expense. Right? They just can't win unless somebody else loses. there's a name for those kind of people. It's on the tip of my tongue. Cunt. Oh, they're cunts. Some days, I just wish I could push a big reset button and eliminate that kind of mentality from the world,

even if it also meant eliminating all the cunts who employ. Within a few weeks of their first date, Chun moved into his small, single room, and became this guy's lover. He seemed to adore her, often surprising Chun with little gifts of gold buttons or flowers. Gold button seems a little strange, but I guess that was a gift back then.

But then after just a short while, Chun got pregnant. And Sobrage changed. Oh, did he ever? Now she met the real Sobraj. He was not happy. Nor was he convinced that he was the father. At least that's what he told her. He heatedly reminded Chun that she floated with every guy who came to that restaurant,

whether that was true or not. That must have stung for Chun extra hard because she had just been fired from her job at the restaurant when her boss discovered that she was dating Sobrosh. Then on April 6, 1944, in the Charity War, of the Saigon Catholic Hospital, Chun gave birth to a monster. I mean, boy. Her son Charles,

who was not known by that name then, he was born as Hachand, Bannani, Gormuk, Sobraj. His mom was in labor for 40 hours, and during that time, Chun was repeatedly shamed by the nurses who were nuns for refusing,

for her refusing to give up the name of the child's father. These nuns, these fucking dumb, nasty bitches who thought loving God meant hate in his creation, said shit like, God is punishing you.

God does not make it easy for the fornicator, and God wants you to suffer for breaking the commandments. He sure made God sound like a dick. Chun did not name a father on the birth certificate, and Sobrage did not visit the hospital, nor was he receptive when Chun and the baby arrived at his shop. And she didn't name the father because he told her not to. Not a sweet guy after all.

He made one thing clear before he would allow them to live with him again. He was not admitting paternity of this child, nor would he ever accept responsibility for the child's upbringing. A little more than a year after Gurmuk was born, so Charles now known as Gurmuk for this point in his life, Ho Chi Minh seized control of Hanoi in the north and proclaimed that his coalition of nationalist rebels called the Viet Minh would soon United Country so long ravaged and abused by foreign colonial powers.

And again, this is Ho Chi Minh of the ICP. I'm here for the weekend, me and his friends, sunny sunshine, blue skies never end. There's a mermaid waiting me to come in. Underwater on my ball she's on Smoking on a flat one We come to have fun I got my dick in your hot dog bun They had a really kind of fun vibe

In Vietnam back then One day in 1945 Chun and baby Gormuk Left the tailor shop to run some errands And got into a taxi And at a traffic light In a section of Saigon Chun did not know well

The doors were suddenly yanked open By a Vietnamese men holding guns They dragged Chun and her baby Out of the taxi One of them pressed a rough cloth Smelling of fumes against Chun's nose And she lost consciousness These men were Vietmen cohorts

And by nightfall they had delivered a ransom note To Sobrage the Taylor Kidnapping had become pretty common in Saigon During 1945, particularly against foreigners Whom the Vietnamese felt were intruders And should contribute in one way or another Towards cleansing the country of alien powers The ransom note sent to Sabrage the Taylor

demanded $10,000 Sent along with a note was a scrap of the linen shirt That the baby had worn, torn and wet And flecked with red that sure looked like blood several years later in a letter written to a friend, Sabrage the Taylor, communicated what happened next. I'm just kind of adding Taylor since Charles also is kind of known by Sabrage later in life. But he wrote,

I could not have raised $1,000, much less $10,000. And I was afraid to go to the police because my visa to work in Saigon had always been a problem. It happened that one of my customers was a British officer. I was sewing him a suit of white linen when he came to get it that night. I told him what had happened to my, quote, wife and the boy. He rounded up a group of his soldier friends, some Americans too, I believe, and they raided the house where the kidnappers were living,

and they freed Chun and Gormuk. I made all of these brave men, eight of them, I recall, a new suit to thank them. Even though I have often thought it would have been better for the Vietnam to keep Chun. Ah, dude, why'd you have to say that shit at the end? You're starting to seem like a kind of nice guy again. It had been over three days before Chun and the baby were rescued.

It took over three days. During that time, they were only given a few sips of water, a few spoonfuls or cold rice, any details regarding how either one of them may have been assaulted, not shared in sources. After Chun and Gurmook came back to the shop, the relationship between Chun and Sobrage rapidly deteriorated further, and they often would have loud screaming fights. Came to light that Sabrage had a wife back in India. Of course he did.

She was never his lover. She was his mistress. Meanwhile, Sobrage frequently accused Chun of infidelity. How did this country girl become a bad woman so quickly? wrote Sobrage to his cousin in Bombay. She spends all of her time painting her nails and her face and cares nothing about me or Gumuk. She also gambles.

Writes the dude about his mistress that his wife doesn't know about. Before Grimuk's second birthday, Chun packed up all of her belongings, including a bunch of gowns, each sewn by Sobrage, and moved out on an afternoon when the tailor was away at some Hindu temple pretended to be a holy man, I guess. That night, Sobrage went to a cafe, ordered an uncharacteristic bottle of champagne.

As a Hindu, he rarely drank. and announced to the other customers that he was celebrating the successful removal of a tumor. Well, kind of funny, but also what a piece of shit. About a week later, John realized she was pregnant again. Fuck. And the only possible father was Sobrage because she was,

or, you know, she was not seeing anybody else. He was the only cheater in this relationship, actually. She turned to her best friend for help, and her friend told her that she needed a new man stat. And then if they hooked up right away, maybe he would think the baby was his. So now I guess maybe somebody else is going to get fucked over in this doggie dog world. Abortion is not legal and French into China.

Historically, interestingly, nobody loves a mistress more than the French, more than French men. But also they are historically Catholic and were anti-abortion until 1975. That was a fun constructive combo for everybody. Chun took her friend's advice to heart. Wen to looking. Saigon was a bustling city, busiest port in Asia at this time. Luxury European-style hotels like the Majestic had full bars with dancing and cocktails from military officers.

So Chun wore one of her most beautiful dresses, went out as many nights as she could. And now nearly three-year-old Grimuk is getting neglected. One night he got so mad at Mom, he grabbed some scissors and cut up her best dress. And you know what? I can't blame him. Chun's crazy plan did work, though.

Worked without the lie, actually. She met a French lieutenant named Jacques Rosul, and he quickly fell in love with her. And when Chun told him that she had one young son and was pregnant with the second child with his other dude, he didn't care so she found a better dude than that dirtbag tailor on september 15th nineteen forty eight the two were married and shortly thereafter he legally accepted paternity of chun's second child a daughter interestingly though uh he did not uh accept custody or you know

paternity well i guess he couldn't accept paternity but he did not adopt uh gourmook and would not give his name to the boy not sure exactly what the reasoning was there uh the new family lived in a spacious military apartment and chun threw her herself into learning French and becoming the model culturally, you know, European housewife. Gurmuk hated his new family. As he grew older, he chatted incessantly about how his real dad, the tailor, one day he would swoop into the house and rescue him from his foreign stepfather. Parental abandonment. Does anything come up more in the backstories of serial killers? Little Germuk was an unruly child who frequently misbehaved. And to punish him, Chun would

spank him or even sometimes tie him to his bed would lock him in his room. After one particularly bad punishment, Gremuk ran away from home, and two days later, Chun received a call from an annoyed Sobrage to Taylor, saying that her son, right, had found him. Not their son. He had made his way across the city of Saigon, broken into the shop, hidden for two days behind bolts of cloth, peeping through a crack and silently watching his dad's sew. So sad, actually. When he returned the child, Sobrage scolded his son, telling him not to ever try that again.

because essentially dad didn't want him. The Taylor had other responsibilities now, he explained, a new wife with a new kid on the way. What a shit back. His punishment, Chun tied little man to his bed again, his arms and legs lashed to his bedposts, freeing him only when he swore tearfully that he would never flee the house again.

Seems a little extreme. I don't know. 1949, Lieutenant Roussel received abrupt orders now, or Roussul, of transfer, back in France, and the family had just two weeks' notice before they needed to move. Gurmuk cried for days, sobbing that he would never, ever leave Saigon his home.

And then for a moment, it looked like he wouldn't. Lieutenant Roussel came home with some troublesome news. A serious problem of legality had arisen with Gurmuk, who had no passport and no identifying documents. His birth certificate, if one ever existed, could not be found, as he was illegitimate. Gurmuk not allowed to travel on his mother's passport. He did not technically legally exist. I guess legally. He did technically exist.

That was a weird phrasing of mine. He did technically exist. I'll confidently say he technically did exist, but not legally. His dad, Sobrage, had done well for himself since his breakup with Chun. So, you know, partly since he hadn't paid child support. She approached him with a request now. As for, I hate to say favor, but I think that's how she phrased it. She wanted Grimuk to stay with his dad,

while her husband's lawyer could establish a legal identity for the child. When that was accomplished, then money would be sent for Guamook's safe passage to France. the Taylor reluctantly agreed. But then the money didn't come. The legal papers necessary to establish his kid's identity had fallen into some bureaucratic crack somewhere and eventually mom gave up. There would be no safe passage.

He had been abandoned again to a dad who did not want him. It would take three years before he would see his mom again. Three years later, 1952, when fighting between the Vietnam and the French military increased and then Lieutenant Rassul was ordered back to Saigon. By the time the Rusul's family returned, the city had grown significantly and so had a little man's family. In addition to the full sibling of Grumuk's, who was adopted by Lieutenant Roussel, not even adopted, just claimed. Chun had given birth to two more kids now.

Likewise, while Grumuk had been living with his dad, the Taylor and his new wife had had three kids and were pregnant with the fourth. Oh, the days before the pill. How fucking horrible they were. Also, Gormuk's new stepmom didn't like him and resented his parents. presence. Germuk was already running wild by this point, refusing to help his dad with work, plotting schemes against his stepmom, usually out and about in the streets, hanging with a gang of older boys, sometimes missing, but not being missed, for weeks at a time. And he is not even nine years old. The fuck. According to author Thomas Thompson, that's a fun name. Sorry, Tom. All right, Tom,

that your fucking family couldn't think to name you anything but fucking Tom, since your last name also starts with Tom. According to author Thomas Thompson, who wrote the 19th, 17-book on this guy, Serpentine. Gurmuk was a liar, a thief, and a danger to the younger children of the house. He was the leader of a pack of Dickensian urchants, fucking street urchants, who lived by their wits, hustling tourists, foreign soldiers, stealing food to eat and sell. They all carried gleaming knives, and no one was over the age of 12. And once his dad heard that his mom was back in Saigon, he was like, he's your problem again.

And now, Chun, once again, worked to have his identity confirmed by the government. And I don't think it's a coincidence. that the dude who will change identity so frequently as an adult had such a hard time establishing illegal identity as a kid. This is just such a part of his life. Finally, after months, a slog in through the courts of bribing lawyers, of obtaining Sobrage to Taylor's enthusiastic signature on a court order that, one, acknowledged the Taylor's paternity of the boy,

and two, permitted him to relinquish parental responsibility for his upbringing to Lieutenant Rosul, a tribunal in Saigon on January 10, 1953, decreed that this kid was the legal custody of the French officer and his wife. Only one loose string remained uncut. Lieutenant Roussel again refused, at the last minute apparently, to award his name to the boy. They did not get along. And so now his legal name is Hachan Banani, Gurmuk, Sobrache.

So it remained that, but now it's legal. And that is a mouthful. Meanwhile, France's position in Indochina worsened and soldiers who normally filed papers and type reports were thrown into combat, including Lieutenant Rusul, who now volunteered for front line duty, excuse me. And he did not fight very long before he was taken off the front lines and put in the hospital. He was injured, and his injury was mental, severe shell shock, very severe. His face was blank, save for this enormous pain you could see in his eyes, eyes that had always been gentle before. Rousoul unable to speak, his only gestures, a continual throwing up of his hands against his ears to blot out the screaming assaults of bomb.

that would not stop exploding inside his head. Makes me think of that song, Zombie by the Cranberries. The lieutenant was ordered to return back to France to recuperate, and as it was unlikely for him to return to Saigon and fight, his family was to come with him. The now 10-year-old Grimuk at first was completely ecstatic, actually, bragging to friends about the good fortune.

But as he time neared for a departure, he began to panic and was insistent that he would not move. He repeatedly ran away to hide in the fabric of his father's tailor shop, and his dad just kept bringing him back to his mom telling him don't come back. Years later, Grimuka would write a letter to a friend and recall this time in his life. I look back and I can't explain it. My stepfather was a kind man who was good to me, even after his injury, but I did not want him. All I wanted was to be with my real father, my own flesh.

I felt an emptiness without him, something that I missed. Even when my mother would find me after I'd run away and tied me up with ropes, I didn't mind her prison, for I felt I was suffering on behalf of my father. father. On the day we were supposed to leave for France, I was confused. I had not slept the night before. I kept telling myself that when the morning came, I would run away and hide until the boat left. But just before dawn, I dozed off, and it was in a half sleep that my mother took me away from my country and my father, I never really forgave her. Man, dad not wanting him really fucked this kid up. After a few months back in France, Lieutenant Roussel was given a new cushy assignment in Dakar, then capital of French West Africa, also. also known at that time as South Paris.

And before heading to Dakar, let's take today's first to two Mitcho sponsor breaks. If you don't want to hear these ads ever again, please sign up to be a space on Patreon, help us make monthly charitable contributions, get the catalog ad free, episodes three days early, and more. Now let's head to Dakar,

capital of French West Africa at this time. The family moved into a large swanky villa, and by 1956, there were seven kids in the family, with Grimuk being the oldest. My God, just fucking everybody popping out kids back then. Lieutenant Roussel found himself rarely able to work full day because his head pains

had returned. From being shell-shocked, he demanded absolute silence at the home oftentimes. It was a tense house. During this time, Chun became a devout Catholic. She had Grimuk baptized and given a Christian name. In 1959, at the age of 15, his name was entered into the records of the church as Charles

now. So he has his name change, the guy who will later change his name constantly. Charles Gurmuk Sobrage. His report cards from this time would foreshadow who Charles would become. One teacher said he has extraordinary

abilities, but he is lazy, stubborn, and accepts no discipline. Another said, this boy learns so quickly that it is a scandal how poorly he behaves in class. Yeah, very smart kid. Become a very smart man. Charles' best friend, Sarak, the son of a Wolof

tribesman, who lived in a nearby native village. The two were often caught pilfering, him shit and causing mayhem. Then one afternoon, Chun awoke to find a police inspector at her home, demanding to know the whereabouts of her son Charles. Charles and Sorok had went in search of a nice cooling swim. They chose a reservoir. But Charles was annoyed at how low the water level was. The officer informed, Chun, this is kind of crazy, that her son then broke into the maintenance station, twisted the floodlocks, and created a substantial flood.

Fucker flooded this area so he could have more water to swim in. When the torrents of water rushed into the reservoir, Surrach his buddy damn near drowned. After that incident, Chun had new locks installed on the door to his bedroom that opened only from the outside and bars put on his window. Mom literally turned his room into a fucking prison cell. Meanwhile, his stepdad, Lieutenant Roussel's condition continued to worsen. He was transferred to Marseille, France, on limited duty.

He would remain on the military payroll for some time, although most of his waking hours were spent in search of a civilian doctor who could help with the pains that continue to pound within his head. So he moves his family from the great villa in Dakar to a small, cramped yellow house in a working-class neighborhood of Marseille. In December of 1950 now, now 15-year-old Charles is escorted home one afternoon by two Marseille police officers. He even got stealing.

And now his parents had had it with him. Chun and Lieutenant Roussel get into a massive fight. They argue about whether or not to throw Charles out if they should ask the state to lock him up in an institution, should they send him to. back east, Indo-China, find his dad. Chun ended up even asking her priest for counsel, and he recommended that Charles be placed in a strict Catholic boarding school.

What? The priest recommending a Catholic school? That's crazy. That's a twist. Charles, when asked, wanted to return to his dad. Chun then, quote, locked the boy in his room until they could decide where to send him. I feel like he got locked up in his room a lot. She also told him some hard truths, basically that his dad didn't want him.

Sobrage the Taylor had not inquired about his son in almost five years. that Sobrage had not sent a single Frank to put food in his son's mouth, that his dad now had more children than he could count, more than he could care for. What a guy. Well, Charles ended up getting sent to that Catholic boarding school, and while there, he would continue to run away. The first time he escaped was just days after his arrival.

He only managed to run as far as the nearest village when one of the priests found and stopped him, brought him back. During his second attempt, fell out of a tree. Sound like he broke his leg. He said sources say hurt his leg, but it sounded like he probably broke it, grabbed again by the priest. Then when the doctor at the school infirmary, telephoned Chan in Marseille to report

he was hurt. Somebody else answered the phone who told him that she and her husband were gone. They'd left to go back to Saigon without him. Good God! This dude was treated like a fucking hot potato growing up. Just nobody wanted to hold on to him for very long. When Charles was told the news that his family had left him again, he supposedly went berserk, wailed and screamed,

believing that he had been, you know, again, abandoned because he had. Then before his leg was fully healed, maybe it wasn't quite broken or maybe wasn't a bad break, he limped out of the clinic and disappeared. Someone from the school sent Chun the following telegram. Charles ran away Friday night search and progress. A few nights later, in April of 1960, just after his 16th birthday,

Charles is found trying to slip aboard a freighter, a big ship, while wearing the clothes of a merchant seaman. He was arrested and brought back to the Catholic boarding school and he would finish out the school year there. Charles would write a letter years later detailing this time in his life. He wrote, actually it wasn't too bad. I was at the point of getting interested in books and ideas, but the priest made me spend too much time cleaning out the stables.

I've often wondered what could have happened if I could have pursued what I was on the edge of doing, plunging into the library. But there is just so much horseshit a boy can shovel. Fair. Less than two months later, Chun received an urgent midnight call from the school. Charles had run away yet again. This time she told the person on the phone, I don't care.

let him run. My husband and I want to turn him loose. He's 16. Mom and stepdad are fucking done with him. For the moment. Charles fled back to Marseille, where he was stowed away in the hold of a ship bound for Djibouti this time in East Africa, just a few miles across the sea from Yemen in the Middle East. So he gets on another ship. His plan is to then find another ship in Africa, one that will bury him secretly across the world to Saigon, where his real dad will be waiting with welcoming, warming, you know, open arms. man fucking deadbeat dads Mom not the best of moments for sure in this episode

but at least he you know tried more than dead several nights out just after the ship had passed through the Suez Canal Charles is caught trying to steal the passport and papers you know from the trousers of a sleeping seaman for the rest of the journey he is held in a makeshift brig

yelling that if the captain will only cable his rich and doting father in Saigon then money will be instantly sent to pay for his passage he's brought back to France not to Saigon or Chun has to pay for his passage both ways on the ship, or he'll be sent to jail. To her credit, she does pay, but she's fucking pissed. In Paris, amongst the Vietnamese refugee community,

Chun had some friends now, many of whom were in the restaurant business. So she makes a bunch of calls on her son's behalf, asked for some favors, arranges for Charles to become a kitchen worker. Also gets a distant cousin to agree to give him a room to stay in. She wants to help him, but she also wants him to get the fuck out of her house. So off to Paris he goes.

Toward the end of 1960, Charles works at one restaurant, and another, then another, then another, and another, unsurprisingly, he gets fired a lot. He hates doing the grunt work to keep giving him, like peeling and chopping vegetables, cleaning crusted sauces from dirty dishes, mopping floors, dodging the wrath of, you know, temperamental chefs. Eventually, though, he gets hired at the famous La Coupol restaurant, I guess French for the Dome, a restaurant that opened back in 1920 and was a renowned dance hall and regular haunts. It's a fucking cool place to be, you know, attended by the likes of writers like Ernest Hemingway, Henry Miller, actresses like Marlene Dietrich,

Dietrich, excuse me, Ava Gardner around that time. And one night while working there against all odds, he runs into his dad. A waiter found Charles, peeling vegetables, told him that a customer asked for him by name. Who, wonders Charles. The waiter shrugged, customer had not identified himself,

some dude dining alone. Seem prosperous, though, well-dressed and foreign. Gormook? The man said tentatively, and Charles was confused because no one had called him by that name in years. Then the man held out his hand in greeting, I am Sobraj, right?

His dad, Charles breaks down, buries himself in his father's arms and sobs. Subraz and Taylor had been busy, and not just busy pumping out fucking kids he shouldn't have had. A business had actually been good, real good, and he'd grown, you know, fairly rich. His one-room shop was now three separate stores, scattered along a high-end shopping district in Saigon.

Sobrage made his son a proposition. You know, after randomly popping back into his life. He had asked his mom, Chun, for permission to take Charles back home to Saigon. So I guess he did have some kind of conscience, where he would train the boy in the clothing business and pay him a salary for doing that. She'd, of course, agreed. And after some difficulty getting him a temporary passport

or travel document, not passport, temporary travel document of some kind, he is off. His dad gave him a rigid work schedule in Saigon. He was expected to rise before the sun to sweep away the scraps of cloth from the day before, clean and oil all the sewing machines, wash the windows, prepare the tea, et cetera,

that kind of work, be ready to welcome customers by 9 a.m. From there, his duties, translated translating French customers' wishes and measurements, and a duty would not end until after sundown every day. Charles did not respond well to this kind of grind. He started slipping away from his duties after just a few weeks,

and then the police would come to his dad's office one day to tell Chabraj that a boy who had no papers, but who represented himself as the tailor's son, was in jail on suspicion of car theft. And now Sabrage decided that Charles had problems because he, quote, simply did not know who he was, know where he belonged,

or nor where he belonged. He possessed no roots, no security, no feeling of membership in either a family or in a national culture. So Brage decided the solution was that Charles needed to become an Indian citizen. And so now he gets shipped off to stay with family he has never met in Bombay, where he will need to live for at least a year to get Indian citizenship. So off Charles goes, alone on a ship to a country where he does not speak the language or know anyone. Once he arrives, he finds out he's staying in a little village more than an hour from the sophistication. of Bombay actually in a poor suburb near Puna.

Also, his cousin's house, not really a house, by Charles's definition, more like a shed, more like a one-room factory shed, maybe 20 square feet in total. That might be an exaggeration, but who knows, where more than a dozen adults and an uncounted number of children, he said, would work, eat, and sleep. So now he's living in a fucking sweatshop. And surprising to no one, Charles fucking hates it. And do you want to know what he does pretty soon? Yeah, that's right.

Good guess. He runs away. First time he tries to flee, he sneaks aboard another ship, a freighter bound for Saigon, but gets caught and thrown off immediately. A few days later tries again, snakes up a rope after midnight, finds a place to hide in the freighter's cargo chamber, this time not found until the boat docks at Saigon, but then gets arrested. Now Daddy, So Braza-Taylor, is called down to the port where he has to pay 45 francs to keep his stowaway son from getting arrested. And before Charles arrived, he'd gotten a letter from the family, Charles had stated,

with telling him that Charles was a fucking arrogant, ungrateful, disobedient, you know, thief who stole from them. Some money had coincidentally vanished when he left. So, Raj now sat Charles down, gave him some hard truth. He was telling him, he told him, like, you know, first off, you only have a temporary visitor's permit valid for six months in Vietnam. And it cannot be renewed. Without proper papers, you could be arrested and jailed.

Second, if you don't want to hide from the authorities after six months, you need to go back to India. Spend a year there like you were supposed to get a proper permanent Indian passport and citizenship. Third, you've worn out your welcome with fucking everybody. Mom doesn't want you back, and I'm starting to regret trying to help you as well. And also, not going to waste any more money on a kid who continually fucks up all opportunities he has given. After this lecture, Sobrage sends him back to Bombay for one last chance at a straight life. If he can't work shit out with his cousins, he's going to wash his hands of him.

Sobrage wrote to his cousins, if he does not stay. there and obtain his citizenship, then let the demons take him. So off Charles goes, back to India, on the SS Laos, but headed back to Bombay. And it again won't work out. This time I will say it wasn't Charles' fault. In March of 1962, he was not permitted to disembark the ship because he did not have proper papers, did not have a permanent passport, this identity situation is fucking him up. All that moving around as a kid to so many different countries, his lack of a proper

birth certificate, since his mom would not name his father, since Sobrage did not want to claim him initially. The drama with his stepdad, not giving him his name. It all left Charles without a clear paper trail as to which country he was actually a citizen of. In the end, rather than let him be jailed in Bombay indefinitely while they tried to figure out where the fuck to send him, after his dad was again done trying to help him, Chun, his mom, cabled the authorities in Bombay, money to bring him to France. She also wrote her son, I expect you to pay me back. We are poor people and you have caused us more trouble and money than all the other children combined. This is the last help I will ever give you. Charles also not allowed to return to the family home. They just want to get him out of jail.

Now, while he's at least not in jail, and while he does end up back in France, Charles' situation is still precarious. He has a French visa, but it's only good for 90 days. And the French consul in India warns him that under no conditions, could it be extended thanks in part to his history of arrests. He also has no money. But in order to find work, he needs a work permit, a work permit given to an alien is a difficult document to obtain, and he is in bureaucratic hell. He's like no man's land. So, he says, fuck it.

Back to theft, I go. In the fall of 1962, after his 90-day visa expired, Charles, now 18 years old, steals a parked car outside of a cathedral in Marseille because he wanted to take a young lady on a joyride.

He gets pulled over for speeding because he's young and stupid. His first documented running with the law as an adult. He ends up getting a sentence to six months in prison, and when his time is up, France is going to expel him from the country. My God, I feel so thankful that my life has never been as messy as this dude's was. Holy shit.

In a later letter, Charles said he spent his six months in prison working in the kitchen and learning karate and Italian. So, you know, I guess at least he was productive. The day he was released, the courts told Charles that he had 30 days to get his affairs in order before he had to leave France. He was scheduled to be deported. And so he calls his mom and asks for some money and for this new plan of his. he wants to leave voluntarily, then sneak into Italy,

wait until his case dies down from a lack of attention in France, then obtain forged documents that will enable him to return to France, easy-peasy, right, and start a new life there. He just needs a few hundred francs to start his journey. He tells her, I want to stay in France, I am French, you made me French. Mom says no. And now she will not see him again for more than a decade. Probably the most peaceful decade of her life.

Charles does not leave France. Instead, he hitchhikes to Paris, where he loses him himself easily in the Vietnamese community for a little while, amongst thousands of refugees that have streamed into the city since 1954 when France began to withdraw from Southeast Asia. He drifts from job to job, getting paid under the table, you know, lives in one cheap hotel after another, always paying in cash. And during this period in his life, Charles immerses himself further into the Parisian criminal underworld.

He meets a dude named Romaine, like the lettuce, I guess, who became a sort of mentor for him, guy who encouraged him to keep up with his karate training. because Romaine and his associates like to do face-to-face crimes like mugging, carjacking. This guy would also introduce Charles to the world of proper high-end document forgery due to Charles needing to get some identity papers that would wreak more havoc in his life if he was arrested if he did not have them. One night he takes Charles to a secluded house in the outskirts of Paris and shows him a guy who allows you to buy a new life for yourself.

He's an older man who sold government ID cards for 8.000. 850 francs and passports for several nations or from several nations, like Switzerland and the U.S., anywhere from 1,000 to 5,000 francs. Charles's new life priority becomes to buy himself a new identity now. Towards that end, in a six-week period in the early spring of 1964, by police count, Charles committed at least 11 different robberies. Probably way more than that. He stole a woman's coat from a restaurant, suitcase from a train station, a sewing machine, so random. 164 cartons and cigarettes, a purse, a knife, a bit of change for a merchant's cash box, and probably much more. He sold this shit at flea markets, trying to raise 3,000 francs for that French passport, but then he gets caught and gets sentenced to three years now at the Maison Central de Poise, this maximum security prison near the Notre Dame Cathedral.

Pozzi originally was built in 1645 as a convent, but then turned in. into a prison in 1821. And life there was fucking bleak. Prisoners not allowed to make a home out of their cells by, say, tacking up family photographs or keeping a box of personal possessions. During the day, when the men were in the common room, guards would like to inspect individual cells, and they would just tear them apart, sometimes for their own amusement. Radio's not permitted, nor newspapers.

Letters were ruthlessly censored and often withheld. Charles had never been imprisoned in a place quite like this before. But here he would meet one of the most influential and central figures of his life. Felix Descania, the eldest son and heir to a substantial family fortune. His family had a long history of philanthropy. Most of his familial predecessors had preferred to donate a lot of the family money.

Felix would take a more hands-on approach to his detriment oftentimes. One day a week, he would volunteer his time and be allowed into the prison, where he was permitted to help inmates with letter writing and other minor personal needs. He would provide a caring, attentive ear for the men he spent his time with.

She seemed like he was a really good dude. He met Charles after he heard about the young man in solitary confinement, not doing well mentally, a man who had had zero visitors come to see him who had made zero friends in the prison. Felix initially asked Charles how he could be of help. And Charles asked him to please act as a mediator in negotiating a reconciliation with his dad in Saigon. He also asked Felix to please keep coming back and visiting him. For the next several Saturdays, Felix came over to talk with Charles and he was told the story of Charles's life as if it were a Greek tragedy. soon between these visits Charles would send Felix letters since they were not destroyed we have some insight into his life around this time

and one letter he wrote please do not abandon me like everyone else you are the most important factor of my life I know I dream too much and take leave of reality but I swear to you I am perfectly aware of reality after all I've endured after all the sordid paths I've traveled don't you think I recognize reality true there was a certain flexibility in my mind that wants to escape now and then through a fanciful spirit

I come back on earth only when it is necessary, but this gives me strength. I am not a double personality. Don't worry. Oh, Felix, perhaps I am just a simple-minded person who is condemned to the slag heap of life. Perhaps I am stupid. On the other hand, perhaps I can touch your soul. Perhaps I can make my mark on this world. I first thought reading this, is that Charles is being manipulative as fuck.

Is that your first thought? I mean, he knew he wasn't stupid. He was smart enough to know that if he could get this nice guy to feel sorry for him, no. He could get his money and connections from him. On his business letterhead, Felix would soon write an eloquent letter on Charles's behalf to Sabrage to Taylor. He did not hide the truth. The Taylor's son was in prison, serving a long sentence for robbery and theft, but Felix believed there were extenuating circumstances. Months went by with no reply, and Charles got pretty fucking pissed off. He then wrote a letter

to his dad and gave it to Felix to send to Saigon on his behalf. Before doing so, Felix read the letter. Here's what it said. Dear Papa, it's really too sad. It's really too sad. that you are my father, that I was born of your flesh. Why is it sad? Because when a father has a son, he has the duty to love him, educate him, then help that son build a future. In all history, isn't that the traditional duty of a father? But you, you pray to God, and you go to your temple, but where is your conscience? If you have one, it must be heavy. You gave birth to a son, and you ignored him, left him worse than a dog, worse than the lowest beast. You are not my father anymore. I renounce you. Live in your abundance. Eat your rich food like a lion. As for me, I only ask

for water and bread. They fortify me every day and give me that strong will to strengthen me and harden my go-up. I want to make you suffer, suffer again and again like a man with cuts all over his body. I will make you regret having failed the duties of a father. Fortune I will have, even without you. It will help me to pile stones on your head. You will remember and you will regret having ignored me all these years. I have stayed more days of my life in prison than out, and the fault is yours. I want this to live in you like a cancer. One day you will take notice of me, but by then it will be too late, Charles. Okay, so, you know, he's like, you know, pretty pissed off a dad.

Fair. Felix never mailed that letter, and Charles was lucky to have him hold on to it. Excuse me, because the response from Sorbaj arrived just before Christmas of 1966 when Charles was now 22. At the end of his letter to Felix, he wrote, Since you tell me in your letters that Charles is a good boy now, and wants to come to Saigon, it is all right with me. If we can overcome the problem of passport and nationality. But I do want to know just what is his idea in returning here.

I don't like people who wander around the girls all the time. Man must work and earn and get married and stand on his own feet. I mean, you know what? I do like to stand on your own feet part. Pretty crazy to write about how man though should get married and avoid other girls without acknowledging that's exactly what he did to create Charles. In early 1967, Charles finally confided in Felix that his mom lived in France.

And now Felix planned to go to Marseille to meet Chun. When Felix rang the bell at the lemon-colored villa on the outskirts of Marseilles, the door was opened by a guy who looked a lot like Charles. It was André, his much younger half-brother. After this guy, Andre, introduced Felix to his mom, to Charles' mom, Felix and Chun now come up with a plan get Charles' French citizenship.

Using Felix's wealth and connections, he is able to utilize a clause within the French legal system that pertained to citizens of French Indochina who had to evacuate that country after France's withdrawal. Such persons were entitled to full French citizenship provided they established permanent residence in France. And this works. While in prison, almost 25 years old, roughly 25 years old,

he at last possessed what most men are given the moment they're born, a legal citizenship, like a legal citizenship, like a legal identity, a fucking passport. However, Charles would not be permitted to live within the city of Paris for a restricted period after release from prison due to the several crimes he'd committed there. And also, Charles would be liable

for service in the French military now like all sons of France. Still, Charles was pumped. And his mood is better for the rest of his sentence. It was at the beginning of 1968 soon and Charles was in the final year of a sentence now. He started to use his time productively, teaches himself German,

so he can more fully comprehend the philosopher Nietzsche, of whom he'd become a, enamored recently. It really is true that nature divides the strong and the weak, he wrote. There are people who are weak from the moment they leave their mother's breast. They are condemned. I believe I'm in the category of the strong. All right.

From the confines of his cell, Charles plans his future life, takes elaborate measurements of his body, dispatches them to Saigon, telling his dad to sew half a dozen new suits for me. Come on, daddy. Enclosed a photo of the modest, he enclosed, oh my God, he enclosed a photo of some kind of fashion, the suit he wanted from a friend. magazine. They should be ready for the day of freedom, he told his dad in the letter. A letter he wrote to Felix on May 10th, 1968, sheds more light on his headspace around this time. Dear Felix, I have put myself on this, such a fucking weird letter. Dear Felix, I've put myself

on the couch, and here is a psychoanalysis of the patient. Subject is naturally sensual. But he is also intellectual and spiritual, and these go counter to his nature. The sensual versus the spiritual, a struggle as old as time, and destined to decline. continue. Subject went through his first love, which was not satisfying. This love was only in the heart, not physical. Now when subject has relations with the woman, he throws up an auto-defense to think bad things about the woman, an unconscious fear of new rejection, like his mother. Hmm, an interesting case, don't you think? That's a fucking weird way to write about yourself in the third person. In the last few months of his imprisonment, he wrote bitterly of his prison experience,

uh, at one point saying, I have stopped having illusions about humanity. And the last life in prison, the guards, instead of trying to help prisoners rehabilitate themselves? O Contrere, they only push you lower into the dirt. The ones who do not want to be rehabilitated, the ones whom society fears, these are the guys that the guards give good reports on just to get them out of here fast, and as soon as they get out, then society suffers. Don't speak to me ever of justice and reform. Sooner or later, they are back inside, back home, and they get the best treatment.

Guards, you see, respect fame, even when it is fame of a garbage pile. Have I told you? is like between prisoners the life here? There should be solidarity to help each other. But they eat each other up like wolves. I live in a jungle. Even though you have seen much and heard much, it is only half reality for the total one has to live in hell.

Ah, but don't think I am suicidal. What gets me through each day is intelligence. My only weapon here is intelligence. It lifts me above the others. The strong man is the smart man, not the man who is muscle-bound. No fall can break a man like me. All right, so he is a cocky, egotistical motherfucker now.

A dude has no shortage of hubris. Chip on his shoulder can be seen from space. He's a very insecure, volatile human being. On the day of his release, Charles is met by Felix. Three suits of hand-tailored clothing are en route from Sobrage in Saigon. He didn't get him exactly what he wanted him, but they're coming, maybe not as many. Several job interviews are lined up, and there was a party this very night to which Charles is invited. What a reception.

What a fresh start. He was given a really good chance now But a reform life Will he take it? Of course not Felix takes Charles to a barber And to a store To pick out an outfit as a loan

Until his new suits arrive It is at the party The night of his relief Where he'll meet his future wife Chantal Companion A girl from a suburb of Paris Barely 20 years old Brought up in a traditional

Conservative Catholic French family Daughter of a butcher And a housemaker She has a job at an office in Paris Where she files papers performs office work for a financial investment company. Charles flirts hard with Chantal at the party.

He tells her that he is the son of a Vietnamese millionaire. He sits around the couch, whispering about a cafe in the car. He swore he would take a tour someday and quote poetry to her. Later that night, he reads Chantal's poem and art. He said, I have learned from an old gypsy woman. Okay. Despite all his elevated talk earlier, he is not reformed at all.

Charles stayed with Felix in the coming weeks The man who had helped him so much Done so much for him But then Charles, that shady motherfucker Where's that is welcome? He steals a bunch of shit from this dude's house and sells it To pay for new clothes and dates with Chantal Fucking just, you know

Bite in the hand that feeds him He gets caught, gets kicked out But Felix does not abandon him Probably should have but doesn't Charles continued to drop by at all hours To ask Felix for money To wax poetically about his love for Chantal when Charles was not ripping off

somebody or begging from the man who had done more from him again than anybody else outside of his parents probably more than his parents more than his parents in some ways he's also working hard to secure Sean Tall's hand in marriage he loved bomb

the shit out of her writing her love letter after sappy love letter and proposing over and over and I'll share some of this sappy shit right after today's second and two mid-show sponsor breaks thanks for listening to those sponsors

hope you heard some deals you like Please use our landing pages and discount codes, save money. Help us continue to get sponsored. Thank you very much. And now, let us get saccharin. What up Charles's letter said? I don't hate people who write shit like this. Eternal woman, little girl, you are mine.

I simply cannot bear the hours. We are not together. I feel like I see this in a French, my shitty French accent. Eternal woman, little girl, you are mine. I know my accent suck, but I amused myself. I simply cannot bear the hours We are not together I toss in my bed

Unable to sleep Summoning portraits of you That fills the walls of my room There is a god Cherie And he sends me to you Pretty grinchy Both accent and content Shantal kept trying to slow things down

Telling him we've known each other only a few months Beyond that she was also worried about telling her parents About the demanding new man in her life Then in August of 1968 Just a few months after his release from prison Charles picked up Shantal and a fancy sports car. He had, quote, borrowed from a friend.

Uh-huh. I bet you can guess what happens here. He was taken into a casino for a night of gambling and drinks and rout. He speaks again of his urge and desire for marriage to this beautiful woman. He says he will be soon leaving Paris for the Far East. Then his father was dangling some alluring, you know, partnership in front of him for this import-export business in Saigon that is not true. Actually, Sobrage, his dad, had recently written a letter to Felix,

declaring that under no conditions was his son going to be welcome in Saigon. In addition to the motherfucker being nothing at trouble, a war there is intensifying with the U.S. President Lyndon Johnson, sending in what seemed to be tens of thousands of new soldiers every month and business is just too unpredictable.

Back to his night out gambling. At one point that evening, Charles is up 6,000 francs, which was half of Chantal's annual salary. But then he lost it all because he continued to play, because that's how it works, then blame Chantal for his loss. driving home he's all fucking moody and sullen he starts driving recklessly while the light mist is falling turning the pavement into glass shantle begs him please slow down this is dangerous but instead he turns up the radio blast the music loud enough to drown her out and then finally she shouts all right you win i'll so marry you uh and that's a fucking crazy decision to make under those circumstances but you know what she won't regret it because things are going to go so great for her in her marriage obviously uh charles laughed lifted his foot off the pedal but then

noticed a police car behind him. Excuse me, siren screaming. He was driving, of course, a stolen car. And also without a driver's license. Oh, and he got nailed for speeding and reckless driving. So he gets sentenced to eight months in a prison and we're on now. Would have gotten more, but Felix helped him again. Should have got ties with him, but didn't. Felix actually paid for a psychiatrist to work with him. After a consultation, Charles did what he did and manipulated this psychiatrist, and they wrote an encouraging report to the judge. Fascinating case. Obviously, there is a psychological deformity of image here that could bring on psychopathic states. This has not yet happened.

The boy is intelligent, highly so. And I believe that psychotherapy could help him if not cure him. Uh-huh. Charles also wrote to the judge, with his own thoughts on himself. This isn't even more third person than before. This fucking lunatic. Charles wrote the following about Charles. Charles is a human being with paradoxical qualities.

He has an intuitive intelligence, fast comprehension. inability to cultivate his mind. Yet he is introspective in a morbid way. He is pessimistic, often worried, doesn't trust people easily, hides a very real lack of confidence in himself as a tormented nature. He exploits 100% the weaknesses of those around him,

is capable of the blind fidelity of the Asiatic, is hungry for money and success, considering these to be noble emotions, ambitions. He has a small conscience, if any. His vanity is extreme with a passionate desire to be liked, but he never admits any vulnerability. He possesses the sentimentality and sexuality of Don Juan is the pathological sense of the term

is capable of politeness, but calculatedly so, impulsive and aggressive. His life is a history of running away, his explanation is he's trying to find a better life in a better atmosphere, but of course he is really running away from himself. Want people to feel sorry for him. He is a judge administering. punishment to himself trying to make his friends and family feel sad and sorry.

A brilliant actor. He is a posier extraordinaire, always running away from reality. How the fuck do you think that would help? If I'm the judge and I'm reading that, I'm like, all right, this douchebag needs to stand for a while. While Charles served a sentence, he and Felix have a falling out. Felix is pissed. He won't take any personal accountability. Well, good on Felix.

Charles does not take well to Felix's criticism, much like his previous prison stage. Charles uses his time to learn some new skills. This time around takes a course in French law, write several eloquent papers, one of which merited a provocative, well-done response from the instructor. He also continued to write Chantal love letters. Of course. One of these read,

My dearest, from the depths of myself, I hear the other prisoners crying every night. Darkness is the lonely hour. Darkness is the moment when a man holds on to the tightest to keep from going insane. I would be one of them. Were it not for you? For the memories that live in my heart.

What a joy you are. What to marvel. What a wonder. And now in a shady French accent. I just will see your last letter with three for the grass enclosed. Do you know which one I prefer? Oh, little girl, you surely know.

It is the pose of you in the basin suits with all the perspectives of your beautiful body revealed. Let us close our eyes And dream, dream, dream that we are lying next to one another. I must have your beautiful love until the last breath of my life and then beg God to leave it all over. God will protect our love for it is an act of purity and perfection. I can see that you are making yourself beautiful for me when I return.

I will find a beautiful little woman so perfect that she will be like a deity, a goddess who dares present herself in front of me. Uh, would that actually be romantic. Coming from like a better person? Or is that always cringy? Are there any ladies suckers out there who would like to get that letter? Like, is there ever a circumstance

where it would not set off alarms but like just be a good thing? I mean, I love love. But that feels like something else. It feels so desperate and phony to me. You know who reminds me of fucking Pepepey Lapew. Anybody else?

Guess who? It is me. Oh, but, pardon me. permit me to introduce you myself. I am Pepe Lepeau. Your lover! I cannot pull up any old Looney Tunes cartoons without smiling. I love those cartoons so much.

But also, I do have to add the, I have to qualify this. Pepe LePue has got to be the creepiest, cringiest Looney Tune character ever. He was literally just a stalker. His entire schick grabbing women. who wanted nothing to do with him and forced himself on them. I mean, that's, that's it. Like, he had literally no other qualities.

That's pretty crazy. Also, fitting to use him for this week's creep, I think. This time around in prison, Charles gets some visitors. While Felix stopped visiting him after they're falling out, an old friend from Saigon came often, and he would bring a container of stew in an insulated jug. Okay, all right. Interesting that you give large quantities of stew to someone in prison.

The next week, he would be allowed to reclaim the empty stew jug whose contents had been gratefully devoured, then as soon as this man left the prison and was able, excuse me, was in a safe place, he would remove the false bottom of the jug and find a drawn blueprint of a home in Paris worth burglarizing. The plan suggested possible approach and escape routes.

Motherfucker. When Charles was near the end of his sentence, he had almost 15,000 francs being held in an escrow account by this friend, the proceeds of his heist planning. On May 29th, 1969, Charles wrote Felix and begs, for forgiveness. He wrote,

Only 23 more days until freedom. I count every minute. I look back on eight lost months, wasted months, months of falling down, months of thinking about a destroyed future, months of remembering a lost friendship of irreplaceable value. I need you, Felix. This serapie, motherfucker, kills me.

He continued with, I want to confess my ungratefulness, so that I will not leave behind in your mind the image of an ungrateful person. With your blessing, Chantal, and I will build our lives. We will find the joy and happiness that is due to us. And to reclaim your friendship,

I promise to put aside the superficial the lies, the cheating. Your son, Charles. Your son, that's fucking weird. I mean, I'm not surprised you guys. This guy's a walking pile of daddy issues. Felix at the time determined to not let Charles back into his life. He does not respond. But then Charles, when he gets released for prison,

he collects Chantal. The two of them set off on a European adventure that he will pay with for his burglary. plenty money he'll see Felix soon, he will send Felix postcards from all of the places they visit, and Felix will forgive him, and then attend their wedding as Charles's best man in late 1969. Freshly married, the two were on cloud nine, when in the spring of 1970, they learn they will have their first child by year's end. But then that very afternoon, the government of France informs Charles that his presence is needed in the military for a minimum of 18 months.

Charles won't make it that long. A fellow soldier will later share with the press. every day Charles was either sick or acting crazy. This guy was incredible. He was able to make his face turn pale and his temperature go up. The moment the doctor put the thermometer in his mouth, he convinced him he had a bleeding ulcer. Maybe the doctors knew he was acting, but they also reasoned he was more trouble and expense and he was worth.

I feel like that's a good way of describing Charles just from a lot of people's perspective. Just more trouble than he was worth. After returning home from service, Charles nearly immediately stole 6,000 francs from his little sister this time because he's such a piece of shit. She's furious, finds out, reports him, good for her. He is arrested, goes back to jail to await judgment.

But then fucking Felix, Mr. Savior complex, turned enabler, convinces his sister to withdraw the charges, and even pays her substantial down payment on the debt Charles owed. You're fucking not helping, Felix. Felix also went before the court in a pretrial hearing and one more time preached a sermon on behalf of Charles. The judge, apparently, was convincing. He agreed to release Charles provisionally.

But unless the money was repaid in full, and soon the charge would be reinstituted. So did Charles pay his sister back? Of course not. Are you kidding? Daddy was in town, and he used all his money to impress Daddy. So bra is the tailor,

whom Charles had not seen for almost a decade, not since he was banished from Saigon and put aboard his ship bound from Bombay. Comes to France, Charles is determined to impress him. He takes him to dinner the first night he is in town to some place called Maxim's as high-end restaurant, and on his plate, he finds a gold watch.

Chantal sat beside him dressed in an elderly. expensive gown. Charles insisted that on driving his father to his next destination in Geneva. As they're driving, Charles impulsively stops their jewelry store outside of Paris, invites his dad and bride to pick out any trinket, anything that catches their eye. When both declined, Charles selects a gold watch band and a Swiss watch priced at 3,800 francs. But when he goes to write a check to pay, the saleswoman refuses to accept it because it's a Saturday, banks are closed, account can't be verified. Charles then puts on a dazzling show,

a little tease of what he's going to do for so many years ahead, convinces her that he is a man of means. Would he write a bad check in front of his wife expected with child and his dad? A distinguished and wealthy visitor from the east? Of course not. Well, she's convinced she takes his check.

Then hours later, while Charles is washing his hands in the bathroom, in this roadside restaurant they've stopped at, Chantal breaks down and sobs in front of his dad. She tells her father-in-law that she and Charles, they don't have any fucking money. He had spent the week prior to his dad's arrival in frantic pursuit of some money. He'd sold some of their furniture, some of their clothing.

Strange and disturbing men had showed up to their apartment after midnight with hidden parcels. She said their bank account was not only overdrawn, but closed entirely. That this entire outpouring of gifts was a farce. Chantal will later say that when he heard all that, Sobrage just shook his head in despair and said, Let me tell you something. You are married to a number one crook. the rest of the trios drive together, a little tense, a little uncomfortable.

Then dad left again with no more intention of ever working with a son or giving him money than he had had when he'd showed up. And then when Charles returned from Geneva, that slimy fuck asked to borrow an old M.G sports car from Felix for the afternoon. Supposedly to buy and bring a table back to his place, because that makes sense, right, when you're buying furniture. I mean, obviously, you need a small sports car to haul it around in. Well, Phoenix does loan him the car and we'll never see it again. of course By nightfall His old restored M.G.

was speeding out of Paris, head in south. Baron Charles, his distraught wife, and their few remaining possessions. They will drive it all the way to Greece. From Greece, Charles, a long ways. Has a plan to drive over 10,000 more miles across half the world into rural Turkey,

down through the deserts of Iraq and Iran, into Afghanistan, dodging the Himalayas, across the corner of India, into Thailand, through Cambodia, and finally to Vietnam. I'm back, Dad. while he is out of the country,

the French police billed a case against him, based mostly on him bouncing checks for various items. He has sentenced to a year in prison and absentia, and after that, permanent expulsion from France. Meanwhile, Chantal's parents are devastated. He had taken their daughter out of the country. Also, Felix will receive a letter from Charles postmarked September 11th, 1970.

Oh, I think I recently in an episode, by the way, said September 11th, 2011, instead of 2001 for the terrorist attacks. I... Slub the tongue. Anyway, this September 11th was 1970 and it was sent from New Delhi, India. It said,

Forgive me. I did not have the courage to tell you that I was leaving, knowing it would make you sad. And if I had seen you, I could not have kept my decision to leave France. Please understand

that I only wanted to break with my awful past and not with you. I can never forget these years. We may work together and you pulled me out of the mud where I was mild. You helped me find myself.

my being, my potential, how you brought me happiness and joy, I'd never known before. I know now, my destiny is here in the east. Chantel and I are going to Zaghan, where we will join my father. P.S. the car has served us well. No mechanical problems. It is like you're whispered inside the engine and told it to take us to India. All the problem was going to Turkey. 1500 kilometers of bad roads, dirt rocks, a wife who kept throwing up. Can you fucking imagine?

Getting that letter from a dude who just stole your fucking car. Fucking balls to tell you how the ride's been. I just want to thank you for keeping your car in good condition. I mean, I kind of roughed it up going through Turkey, but, you know, it's not bad. A little beat up and not bad. It's going to be hard to feel sorry for Felix if he ever takes Charles back, which he will. During their long sojourn from France to Saigon, Charles and his bride will stay in luxury hotels, running up tabs in the bars,

buying luxury goods from boutiques by writing bad checks, then skipping town, just over and over again. As Chantal enters the final months of her pregnancy, the couple moves from New Delhi to Bombay. There on November 15th, 1970, Chantal will deliver a healthy baby daughter in Bombay's finest hospital, and they will name their daughter, Usha.

The couple thrived in those first few months in Bombay, off other people's money. Charles getting more and more skilled at Conn people. He found an immediate acceptance at the Alliance, Francois, this international club with chapters all over the world, the goal of this club is to spread the French language and culture as far and wide as possible. He ingratiates himself so much here that the associate director offers the handsome fuckface and his beautiful wife and baby a guest apartment for very little rent

until Charles can find something more suitable. For three months he will live as a guest, Charles will, and be admitted to cocktail parties and official receptions for various dignitaries. Guessing he also never paid any rent. And then Charles found a new business opportunity in Bombay. A lot of wealthy people there who wanted to drive expensive, ideally American cars. These were scarce, very expensive.

Basic Chevy would cost $25 grand if obtained legally, and only then after a very, very long wait and a lot of red tape. Through his recent contacts in the diplomatic world, Charles had met a bunch of film stars and business execs who wanted these cars

and did not care how they got them. So Charles would now take an order for, say, a Mercedes, and request a, this is a scheme. You would, you know, okay, take an order for like a Mercedes, Mercedes request a $2,000 deposit in some hard currency like Swiss francs. He would then fly to Tehran, Iran, purchase a stolen Mercedes that have been driven there from

Europe after been picked off of some street in a place like Paris, have new ownership papers forged making Charles a legal owner, then drive it back to India, where in Bombay he would go to a garage where he and a mechanic would strip it of its radio, air conditioning unit, spare tire, most of its vital innards, then just barely able to drive it. He would take the wounded car to a, I don't actually know. you know what, I'm going to take the air-conditioning part back. I don't know if, I don't know if it had that. But he'd take, like, you know, like a bunch of its little parts off of it.

And then drive the wounded car to a forest outside of Bombay, where he would stage a minor wreck, like a little fender-bender, something like that. He would then call the police to report the car is stolen. And why would he do all this? Well, to obscure his name from the ownership records. Pretty soon the police would find it, notified Charles. He would curse and sigh, consign it to an auction dealer to sell his junk. Charles would then know the day and moment it was going to be auctioned.

He would put in a secret bid in the name of his car. customer buy the car back for pennies in the customer's name, put all the equipment back in, repair the fender, transfer the papers, sell it to the customer for $20,000. And he repeat that, hard-to-trace crime, you know, process five or six times over. And he would use the money he made to lease a swanky apartment for he and his family in Bombay. But while Charles is thriving now, Chantal, starting to fall apart. A letter she wrote to a friend back in France around this time read, Oh, Camille, everything here is so confusing.

the cleaning woman belongs to some strange cast and wears gauze over her mouth so she won't accidentally swallow a gnat and kill it I don't know if that's true or not but that is kind of extreme I just point to things I need done nobody understands me my beloved husband travels on business most of the time Usha is beautiful and my salvation if I didn't have my adorable daughter I would be very unhappy right she's very lonely she's lonely because Charles well she doesn't know anybody there

and other than Charles and Charles is leaving his family for long stretches of time to travel for some scams or to gamble. He's crisscrossing through Asia and Europe, hitting casinos, you know, I imagine fucking around his wife, leaving Chantal completely in the dark. Chantel's diary, which later would fall into police hands,

reveals her desperation. On February 20th, 1971, she wrote, waiting for my husband with impatience. February 21st, I'm a bit worried. Where is he? February 22nd, I am more than worried. February 23rd, I am very anxious. February 24th,

God help me, my baby. Where is he? Charles, please send him back to me. March 4th, finally news, my beloved is on his return journey. March 12th, at last he is here, my heart sings, and then just two days later, March 14th, despair, gone again, Bombay to Hong Kong, now we die a little until he returns. In June of 1971, Charles moved his wife and daughter to a hotel in Macau, a city that belongs to China, again at this time, but belonged to Portugal in 1971. so he could be near this big casino he preferred to gamble at,

and so Chantal would stop, you know, complaining about him always being gone. Well, this move does not help Chantel. She comes down with dysentery. And whenever Charles loses at the casino, he blames her. You know, it's her fault. He has bad luck, takes it out on her. Gone are his sweeping declarations of love and affection. No more love bombing.

Chantel finally had enough wrote her parents a desperate letter, asking to please cable airfare home to Paris for her and their child. Back comes a prompt answered. They would love to, but they don't have the money. They can't afford those tickets. Following that, Charles once again leaves his wife and daughter behind and sets off on another quote-unquote business trip. In June of 1970, Chantal writes four desperate and impassioned letters to Charles,

her tears actually falling on the pages and sending them. In each, she pleads for him to please return, rescue his wife and daughter from, quote, the psychological hell of Macau. She begs him to abandon his gambling, his, quote, violence towards her, and his dreams of great wealth. All she and the baby want is for Charles to, be with them. A thatched hut on a beach would serve as just as well as a palace.

He gets another chance to fucking turn things around. Charles now, instead, given his baby girl, a taste of the childhood that he had, right? Repeating part of his cycle. He will not return. Macau, a dangerous city for him at the moment, because he owes that casino there that he likes to go to that is not named $40,000.

To pay them back, he's planning quite the robbery. He wants to rob the Grand Oshok Hotel and its jewelry store. The Oshok really, really. just the jewelry store. The Ashok had been built in 56 by the first prime minister of India to host, or to host, rather, world leaders and dignitaries for the ninth

UNESCO conference held in New Delhi. The Ashok showed the world that India could host presidents and royalty, that they were no longer an impoverished former colony but a world power, an equal, a dignified host. It proved they didn't need to rely on British-run establishments to represent the country and that the state

could create something modern, homegrown, and impressive without private capital or foreign branding. During the summer of 19-7 with Chantal and Usha still in Macau, with almost no money to live on, Charles lived lavishly at the Obroi Intercontinental, a hotel that had opened in New Delhi, 1965, is India's first modern international five-star hotel

under assumed names, while the Oshook Hotel and his jewelry stores were scrutinized. This heist Charles was planning would put George Clooney's Danny Ocean from Ocean's 11 to shame if he were to pull it off. Charles partnered with a guy named Maurice to bankroll the heist. He flew to Tehran, to purchase a pneumatic drill, flashlights,

walkie-talkies, other tools, the quality merchandise available in Tehran, considered by the underworld superior to that of any other Asian city at that time. He recruited two more guys

in Karachi, Pakistan, both French, both named Pierre, Pierre I'm Pierre and Pierre Tu. From a New Delhi printer who did not ask questions, Charles had business cards

of the highest quality printed up, introducing him in discreet, raised script as Jay Lobel, director of the casino at Macau. On a late October night in 1971, he and a small crew put their plan into action.

They broke into the room in one of the hotel's Rouge, noir, cabaret nightclub, its most renowned performers, this dancer whose room just happened to sit directly above the jewelry store. The men tied up the performer and told her that if she screamed, she'd be killed. Then they started to drill through the floor. They drilled all night, but the first drill bit snapped in two. Then a second snapped as well. They couldn't penetrate the floor. Frustrated. Charles pulled out a building plan of the hotel from his briefcase,

poured over it, came up with a new plan. An air conditioning duct seemed to lead from the second floor of the ceiling just above the jewelry shop, you know, down there he could crawl into it, so he tried to crawl in, but it didn't work just a little too narrow, despite his slim frame. So a third plan quickly devised. He tried

to obtain some acid to eat through the floor, but none of his underworld associates could get it to him fast enough. So now he throws a Hail Mary. He holds a gun to the dancer's head, tells her, call down to the jewelry store. She does. She asks the salesman, who answers the phone to bring a sample of his best wares up to her suite. She is indisposed, unable to come personally to the shop. Her orders are explicit. She sends back the first round

of gems then, saying they're not fine enough, not, you know, high quality enough. The next time the owner of the shop himself walks up personally. He brings a breathtaking array of jewels and necklace of gold and rubies matching earrings that would cascade to the shoulders an elephant brooch of exquisite jade with emeralds, rings with sunbursts of sapphires. Once the case is open, Charles pops out of the bathroom with the gun, then leaves the owner and the dancer with the two pires, takes a key from the jewelry store owner, makes his way back down to the shop. Downstairs he robs the rest of the store,

then takes the jewels in a suitcase to fly at a New Delhi while the two piers leave the city by train to Bombay. From there, they will catch a flight. They're all supposed to rendezvous shortly in Toronto. But when Charles makes it to his airport gate, he runs into a problem. He had paid for his ticket in Indian currency, but that was not allowed except for citizens, which he is not. foreigners have to pay in hard currency

like American dollars, British pounds, you know, francs, the like. Charles tries to bargain with them, but they will not make an exception. Then, as the argument escalates that attracts the attention of some nearby police, Charles panics, tells the clerk he has a bathroom emergency,

runs in there, supposedly leaves the fucking briefcase with the jewels in the bathroom, slipped out of the airport, and catches a train to Bombay. That's what he claims. I bet he just fucking took that shit for himself. Did he do that? Go through all that trouble?

then ditch to Jules, I doubt it. He later wrote a friend about that night saying, I would have happily gone through that entire experience again. I felt alive every moment and dead when it was over. So he makes it to Tehran with no jewels, allegedly. Somehow, his associates there don't murder him. Maurice, his financial backer, instead wants him to rob a small bank in Bombay to make it up to him.

So Charles sends word to Chantal for her and Usha to meet him there. But then Charles will not make it. Instead, on November 12, 1971, he's arrested on charges of car theft and fraud. One of his long ago customers, a lawyer to whom he had sold one of the imported European automobiles, had recently been arrested for illegal paperwork. And he had revealed that the seller of the Mercedes he was driving had been one Charles Sobrosh. The lawyer had given police a detailed and accurate description of him.

Charles exploded with wrath. He's outraged over this case of mistaken identity. He reaches for his identification papers. In his breast pocket, he normally carried a false passport to split. moved over on comfortable encounters like this, but he inadvertently withdrew as well one of the calling cards saying J-lobo, director, the casino at Macau. As every newspaper in India had for the past week carried breathless details about the, you know, Ash Took Hotel Jewelry Store robbery, it did not take long for police to realize a major fish had ended up in their net. At the time of Charles'

arrest, police confiscated a number of revolvers, rifles, and other weapons from him. Shantal's diary entry for that day read November 14th, 1971, My Life Ends. Charles quickly gave a detailed confession in French, hoping he could claim later it had been mistranslated. Then several days after his arrest, at a magistrate court appearance, Charles suddenly doubled over and would appear to be excruciating and genuine pain. A decision was made to perform an appendectomy. It was more than Charles had bargained for us, since, you know, he's faking all this.

He only wanted admittance to the hospital for like a stomach bug for a day or two, during which he was going to try and find a way to escape. Instead, now he has a surgery. He does not need, and they actually do operate on him, and remove a perfectly good appendix. Then a few days later, while Charles is recuperated in a private room, guarded 24 hours a day. On the night of December 4th, 1971, Chantal is permitted to visit him.

And while they visit, the guard apparently falls asleep. And Charles convinces Chantal to steal the handcuff keys off the guard and to switch places with Charles. Jesus Christ. She does this and it works. for a day. He gets caught within 24 hours. And now not only is he put in jail, but so is Chantal,

and their baby is placed in stay custody. This guy's a nonstop menace. Through a friend in Paris, Shantal wrote, All I want to do is leave this part of the world and come back to civilization, France, and I never want to see Charles again. Charles now obtained a private lawyer

who visited Saigon on his behalf to ask his dad for help. He found out Mr. Sabrage, aged, obese, and dying. The lawyer told him that his son was in prison and that he needed $40,000 rupees for bail that his son promised to pay back and his son of course loved him very much. Charles's dad surprisingly to me gave him the money.

And with that money, Chantal was at least able to send Ushah back to France to be cared for by our parents the baby and Charles posted bail for he and his wife and then they immediately skipped bail. He and Chantal left New Delhi for Bombay where Charles purchased two crudely forged passports on the street.

Used those to get into Pakistan or more genuine looking passports were for sale, and then they used those to get into Kabul, Afghanistan, where Charles promised his wife that they would stay only briefly while he attended to more business. They would stay in Kabul for two months. Then when they finally tried to leave,

Charles is arrested again in the airport for not paying their hotel bill. It fucking never ends. Chantal, penningless, has to stay on the street, has to sleep on the street for a couple days until two men find her men Charles had sent for her. They give her a note,

a false passport, one and some money and in the note charles apologizes for the small spot of trouble charles then sends to at least six months in a cabul prison this terrifying place the color of mud built into a hillside with a huge thick medieval doors with leather and studs a cellmate of charles is called red-eye that's fun and he apparently said uh that uh zang prison was rock bottom that nothing was provided for prisoners save a cell to confine them No food was served, and unless an inmate had funds to purchase it, if not, he would just wither and die. No blankets were available, no medicine, no protection from the rats, from occasional venomous snakes slither and about. Unlike the French prisons that Charles had previously been in, here if a prisoner had money, he could hire an errand boy, interesting, who could be dispatched to the bazaar outside the prison walls, where food, supplies, or drugs could be purchased and brought back in. What the fuck?

What in the third world is happening here? Charles was in De Mazang There we go The Mazang for just a few days Before he decided how he would escape He determined that a tunnel could be dug From the floor of the mud hut

Underneath the wall And then surface once again At the edge of that bizarre He bent a teaspoon Crouched down Made a modest scratch in the rock hard earth Over the next few months Supposedly he and some other inmates

Did start to dig a tunnel But they got caught And they got beat half to death Then months later Charles chloroformed a guard though Allegedly walked out of the prison and started heading for Tehran. He later claimed the following happened after that.

I left Kabul. I left my wife there to look after the charges against me. I'm sure she was thrilled. I went first to Pakistan, bought a forged passport. So many fucking passports being bought. Then I went to Karachi and Tehran, where I stole the passport of an American businessman. I flew to Rome in mid-1972 using this American's passport.

In Rome, I remained only a few hours, and then flew to Paris to visit my mother-in-law and pick up my daughter, Usha, who was very glad to see her father. We telephoned Chantal in Kabul, sang a song to her on the telephone. We then flew to Rome, then to Copenhagen, stayed for two days, then I hired a big fiat, paid $150, advanced deposit, drove with Ushah to Yugoslavia, and was then headed for Bulgaria. I purchased about 20 passports from some hippies in Rome near the Spanish steppes. These were professional hippies,

so I was fully satisfied that the passports were clean. When I got to the border crossing between Yugoslavia and Bulgaria, everything was found until my daughter spilled water on the car seat where my passport was resting. It got wet, and the customs authorities became suspicious. They told me to pull my car to the side, and when they opened the luggage trunk, they found the 20 passports I had purchased in Rome. There was no important official at the border at this hour at the night, about 11 p.m., so they took me to a village about 11 kilometers from the border. The car was detained by customs authorities. They told me to report the next day at 9 a.m. To see the chief. My daughter and I had had a late supper, and then we decided to leave.

We took a taxi all the way across Yugoslavia to Italy. Well, that was some taxi driver. And then he wrote, oh, I forgot to say that along the way I managed to buy, so many fucking passport. I managed to buy two new passports, one for me and one for my baby girl. We put our pictures on them and changed the names. It was as easy to cross the border back into Italy. We flew to Rome. There I was able to buy 10 new passports, all good ones, and I flew next to Beirut,

not a good city from my line of work. Then we went to Pakistan and finally back to Tehran where my wife, Chantal, was supposed to join us. We stayed at the Hilton. I met an Italian girl at the Hilden whom I had known earlier in my career. She managed to get one passport. Why the fuck does he have to get this many fucking passports? She managed to get one passport from me from a businessman. And when this man reported the theft, the Italian girl was arrested.

She informed the police about me. I was picked up. My daughter was put in the care of the French embassy, Jesus Christ. Usha was sent home to Paris to live with grandparents, her grandparents. And I was convicted on passport fraud and given six months imprisonment. My wife, Chantal, flew from Tehran, from Kabul, came to see me in prison. then on my advice, left for France. That was a lot.

That was a lot of ping pong it. The report that Iranian police would compile on Charles' activities in 1972 alone would reveal that he called himself Dr. Jalian Claire, Charles Sounder, Adolf Nomer, Dr. Marshall Goliin, and Selim Haradie. He represented himself to be everything from a professor of classical literature at the Sorbonne to an Arabian oil sheikh. His principal endeavor during this period seemed to be trafficking stolen gems and stolen passports.

The arrest in the Toronto Hilton was Chantal's breaking point, her final straw. She went to the French embassy for help. They were given Chantal a ticket back to France where she could file for divorce and she would. She would change her name. She was at her parents' house by Christmas Eve, 1972. Meanwhile, this whole time, Charles has been writing Felix letters. Charles loved to write a letter. Felix no longer indulging Charles this time, but had taken Andre.

Charles's younger half-brother under his wing. What the fuck? Get away from this family. Felix helped Andre find a false... Had helped him find a small flat, loaned him some furniture, and got him a job as an apprentice clerk in an insurance office. Why was he doubling down on this family?

Then one summer night in 1973, the telephone rang in Andre's apartment. As Andre would later recall, the voice that was instantly recognizable. It is Charles. It is time for you to become a man. I'm in Istanbul. Istanbul.

I need someone I can trust, I'm sending you a plane ticket. There are two kinds of people in this world, those who take risks and those who don't. Well, like a fucking idiot, Andre leaves his life in France, his comfortable life, and heads to Istanbul. Oh, man, risks do not have to involve constant crime. In Turkey, Charles told his brother to call him Elaine Gutier. That's what he's going by now. And to go, sorry, and he starts training him, making him study karate, philosophy, current events, so he can sound smart and grift people. makes him learn multiple languages for their world travels.

Charles also tells his brother to never use anything that can be used as evidenced against you later, if possible, like weapons, right, no guns, no knives, and no drugs. You don't deal them. You don't use them. Charles and Andre plan on taking advantage of the young people on the hippie trail now, right? Like he's bought these passports from a bunch of hippies over the years. He's starting to target them in the 60s and early in mid-70s. It had become quite popular for young counterculture youth to drive Volkswagen buses and the like, this so-called hippie trail, this alternative Silk Road, Modern Silk Road that wound through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Nepal. This trail would take people

through places like Go India where hippie beach community slash commune had developed and the road, but really just travel route would spread further into Thailand, Indonesia, even Australia. And along every major stop at this hippie trail, you know, there were hostels, hotels, restaurants, cafes, catering to Westerners who would network with each other. they traveled east and west. A lot of people hitchhiking, a lot of weed and opium being smoked, a lot of yoga being practiced,

probably a lot of nudity, a lot of free love fucking guitars are being played, drums are being beat, cultures are crossing, but then the route will become too dangerous to be commonly traveled by the 1980s thanks to a bunch of war and revolution.

Sounds like quite the fucking adventure for somebody young and curious. And these two assholes want to try and ruin it. Years later, Andre will recall how easily Charles recruited their prey, saying he had a good thing extraordinary power over women. Give Charles a few hours around a girl, and even if she were convent educated, and the daughter

of a police inspector, she would usually do what Charles asked her to do. He represented mystery, intrigue, and romance. He was a woman's fantasy of one moment of adventure and danger. All right. Charles and Andre, I mean, I will say he was a good-looking dude, old picture of him. I'll give him credit. He dressed very cool, you know, very charismatic. Charles and Andre built up a team of loyal, beautiful hippie women to help them steep.

deal from other hippies now. Hippie on hippie crime. Those judasers. Over several months in late 1973, Charles and Andre and their cohort successfully robbed a bunch of tourists around Istanbul. Charles also stole and smuggled a lot of passports. Interpol, the world's largest international police organization will later state that Charles robbing tourists helped him evade local police notice as his victims were usually

only around for a few days, right? The transient people. But then he and Andre got arrested on a trip to act. Athens, heading down to Greece from Turkey. After their arrest, Charles proposed an escape plan. What if we switched identities? What if you pretend to be me and I pretend to be you? Think about it, Andre.

They only really want me. I have the record, so let me be you. And since you have no record, they will then let me walk. Then, once I have exited, you tell them that you are you, and then they let you walk. It's so clean. Andre reluctantly agreed to this bullshit plan, and it would fuck him. Let's find out how.

In today's time-suck timeline, where we have more concrete dates for things going forward and where Charles will enter a new era of his crimes. Shrap on those boots, soldier. We're marching down a time-suck timeline. On April 26, 1975, after receiving a very light sentence because people thought he was Andre.

They actually fucking do this. Charles succeeded in escaping while being taken to a prison on some Greek island by lighting a fire in a prison van and slipping away made the smoke. When Andre heard that Charles was free, like they had planned, he tried to correct the officials there, let the prison warden know that, I'm not Charles, I'm Andre. The authorities didn't give a fuck. They were like, fuck you.

And they give him an 18-year prison sentence. Damn. or rather his 18-year prison sentence that he already been given was not changed and his half-brother Charles just left him to rot never came back to trying to help him just over a week letter

May 4th, 1975 Charles is aboard a 747 on the way to New Delhi from Tehran traveling by the alias of Elaine Gutier again Gutier or Gautier had made friends with two travelers on the flight the two travelers, co-workers from France

who worked as reservation clerks and were headed out on a 10-day vacation in India Gautier, Tosin, he was a professional photographer We were traveled in India And he would be delighted to help them not be taken advantage of by the locals He offers to help them rent a beautiful houseboat Go on an adventure, and they agree When they go to rent the houseboat, they realize they get a much better deal

If they split with the third group And so they make friends with the couple from Quebec, Canada Marie-André Leclair and her friend Jules And Charles thinks that Marie-Andre is fucking hot. She is almost identical to my ex-wife, Chantel. The five of them rent a houseboat, named the Sultan's Embrace and set off on adventure.

Sultan's embrace, typical houseboat built by a British tourist in the 19th century who were unable to purchase land in Kashmir, who were able to lease water rights, though, 90 feet long, 15 feet wide, built of teak and mahogany, very intricate carvings. The boat is permanently anchored

in an inlet of a dull lake, beautiful lakes surrounded by golden pink, lotus blossom. each couple takes a private bedroom. It's very romantic. Elaine, which Charles moves into the third. The moment they stepped foot onto the Sultan's embrace, Elaine took over, became the de facto captain of the ship,

master of everyone's life. First night at dinner, Elaine bragged about his many accomplishments, telling the others, he is a French national champion in karate, decorated military hero, and the professor of a law degree from the Sorbonne. Oh, and he's also a photograph Leopards in Kenya. Oh, and also served in the front lines

during the Vietnam War as some kind of Rambo motherfucker. Nothing is over. Nothing. You just don't turn it off. Elaine flaunts his muscles, takes his shirt off a lot, you know, does karate's tances

for these women, and it works. I mean, I will say around his age, he's like 31 now. He did have this kind of like Bruce Lee vibe. I'm going for him. Marie Andre, she eats it up. She falls hard.

Over the next few days, Elaine rents a car takes a group to the village of Goulmurg, where one of the world's highest golf courses spreads out at 8,700 feet above sea level. It's breathtaking on the last night and the Sultan's embraced in, Charles, seduces Marie-André. Oh, we, we.

The next morning, the French duo leave to return home. While Elaine stays with Marie-Andre and the third wheel, Jules, Elaine now takes control of Marie-Andre and Jules' vacation. And on May 14, 1975, he insists, oh, we must go further into Catmander

then there after just a few days in Nepal he insists they need to go to Bangkok second day in Bangkok uh jules is hit with terrible diarrhea and insists that marie andre continue on without her touring with elaine very likely based on what it happens coming next uh coming along in the timeline that charles drugged her and gave her these stomach issues elaine now tells uh mori andre that all of his closest friends call him charles yeah of course they do uh marie andre and jules that's they fly back home to Quebec, May 25th. Marie Andre will tell her sister that she has made a very important business man who is rich

and looks like Bruce Lee. He wants to fuck a pussy in Bangkok. He wants to fuck my pussy in Bangkok. Some version of that is what he told her, all right? I don't fucking know what she told him. Then just days later, the love bombing began in earnest. He likes the love bomb and the letters start to pour in. The first letter to arrive was kind of a poem, I guess.

eternal woman eternal love Eternal petite Andre I love you I adore you Come back to me Charles All right

I think he pronounced her name Like Andri Andrei Andre I love you I adore you Come back to me Next was a quick note Petit fame

Adoree I love you I want you to become my wife I need you Your presence Your love I want you to believe In our love Cherie

True We must not make decisions quickly But these opportunities they do not repeat themselves every day. It is necessary to know in life, Cherie, when to seize the opportunity. When you want it, my love,

you can become my wife. I kiss you tenderly, my love. I adore your body, my darling. Oh. A smile was all you gave to me. And we will be as happy as can be. He fucking, he is Peppie Lapew. 14 postcards

Arrived from Peppily Snake And one day at one point Each embarrassingly nauseatingly Encrusted with love from Charles Then he started love bombing her with telephone calls Each day of June Marie Andre would rush home to check her mailbox And to sit by the phone and wait for her lover

June 28th In Singapore Charles goes with the Hyatt To visit a Cartier-Jewler rep He had met previously in Hong Kong Over breakfast Borrow's the keys to the guy's room Guy trusts him and he fucking roves him blind takes a bunch of silk shirts

just delivered from the tailor two new suits a silk robe, two calculators, a camera, a crocodile skin attach a case. Before he left, he went to the front desk with the room key, asked for the key to the safe deposit box for this guy, which he got, and then he cleaned that out. Finally, after buying five diamond rings with this

poor bastard's credit cards, he flies on to Bangkok. Just wrecking and ruining lives, wherever he goes. And we still haven't even got to the murders. On June 29th, Charles sent two letters that would drive Marie-Hen-Ré to give up her life in Canada and fly halfway around the world to join him

so he can fuck a pussy in Bangkok a quote from the first My darling I love you more and more and desire strongly that you have my child I would love for you to be my wife and the mother of my children and then the second

during the past couple of days in Colombo I met the three Swiss couples from Geneva they have come to adopt a baby this meeting made me desire more strongly for us to have our own child. We'll be able to have our baby by the end of 1976. What do you think, my darling? Because by then we will be stable.

I have so many places and so many things to show. I desire your body and your creases. My cherie, adoree, I want to fuck your pussy in Bangkok. I am your guide to love. No? Together we shall explore the heights of delight.

The conquest of Everest will pale into insignificance. We shall send the matter home of... Uh, Marie-A-M-Ans-ray, he is like a cartoon character. Uh, leaves her Bangkok. She does, she does, to be fair, I've been saying silly things, but she does go to Bangkok technically to get a pussy fuck. On August 1st, 1975, on the plane ride, she decides to start a journal.

Her first entry read, I'm arriving in Bangkok. I feel like I just, like a just married girl, coming for the first time to the bed of her heart. husband, nervous but happy by the thought of a journey to be taken and possessed by the man she loves. See? Okay. All while sending Marie-Andre the love letters and begging her to come to Bangkok while

he's doing this all the while, Charles is also, like father-like son, fucking other women, juggling multiple girlfriends. One of which is a Thai sales girl for a jewelry shop named Anne Shea-Pong. He was a frequent customer at her shop, frequently bought her gifts, love-bombed her as well, on the way to pick up Marie-Angre from the airport. He visits Anne. He tells her, hey, I got to meet a friend from Canada, who's arriving to join my business.

He then leaves to fetch Marie-Andre, brings her back to Anne's shop. Oh, heartless. She had just flown more than 28 hours to get there. When they step inside the shop, Charles introduced it to and introduces her as a friend, says, this is Anne, my girlfriend. And this is Marie-Angre,

who has come from Canada to be my secretary. That is a fucked up bait and switch. Charles also tells Marie Andre that she will now go by Monique. And Marie Andre is too embarrassed, apparently, to turn around and go home. She will write in her journal, I find my love rather distant,

giving me the impression of not wanting us to be intimate. I am disappointed. Yeah, she does not get her pussy fucks. She is quite disappointed. After the second day, the only word is disappointed. Disappointed by his behavior towards me. I have the feeling of not being able to please him. I have the feeling that,

his love for me is not that deep, and the worst of it is that I shall have to play the role of a secretary toward a woman he wants to conquest. He will fuck her pussy, but he will not feel my pussy will give cobwebs, eat a real dusty and shriveled up. After all, that love bombing. Pepe, oh, you're a dirty motherfucker.

Marie Andre had just a two-week visa, but she had brought $2,000 in cash all her savings to get herself home if things didn't work out. And when Charles finds out that she has that money, oh, he is suddenly so, sweet again. That's weird. He tells her I'm only dating Anne for pretend because I need something from her to set up my gem business.

And now Marie-A-onsrey is dumb enough to loan him $1,000. She will, of course, never get back. Marie-Andre's visa expires, August 15th. Charles gets her an extension, but also for doing her that favor wants another $500, which she gives him. So now she does not have the money to get home. She will write in her journal,

Life is going on. I've had two weeks of physical relations with Charles. Okay, so that part worked out. that finally gave me a sense of communication, both physical and spiritual. I got my pussy, folks, in Bangkok. That's a good part. Some tenderness that is essential to me. I did, after all, give up my family and my country to be with my beloved. Oh, Marie-on-Zre, you poor honey-fool.

September 6th, an Australian couple lays on the sand at its high resort. Their stomachs raw and grumbling in the aftermath of a bout of painful diarrhea and vomiting. They have been spending the last couple of days with another couple, Jean and Monique Belmont. When the couple made it back to the railway hotel, they found their passports, marriage certificate, driver's licenses, and all other identifications stolen, as well as they were missing $900 a camera

and all of various jewelry. Jean and Monique are, of course, Charles and Marie-Andre. Charles uses this money to lease a flat called Canada House that he will use as a headquarters, right? So now he's getting used to drugging people and stealing from them. And he will take this further. Charles will take a wealthy tourist, André, Brugnaud, Shanghai, and on the drive back to Bangkok,

he will meet a young Frenchman, Dominique, and bring him to Conant House as the man is now sick with the stomach book, because he's gotten him sick too. The next day, Andre, aged 56, is found dead in a hotel room in Chiang Mai. His death not suspected a foul play at the time, but some have thought, many have thought, Charles killed him drugging him in order to steal from him. Week later, September 28th, Dominique, ready to move on from Kennet House.

He tells Charles, I need me. my passport and my money back. And then suddenly he gets very sick. Charles had spent the money and now drugs Dominique to keep him sick. He is also trying still to set up that gem selling business. A new face appears for dinner one night at this time. And Marie Andre at first mistakes him to be a customer. This Indian man from New Delhi named Ajay Chaudhry, she will describe as polite, quiet, sexy, and devilish handsome. Oh, Marie-André! you are so honey, you are so desperate to get your pussyfucked again. Charles introduces him as an old friend,

but not specific as to when and where they had met. Perhaps it had been an hour ago, perhaps five years. One never knows. Over the next few days, Ajay quickly moves in, becomes second command, sort of a permanent shadow of Charles. Marie Andre gleanes a few more bits of info about him. Ajay said he was a son of a New Delhi foreign car importer whose life veered towards the upper class, well-educated.

He's an apparent narrow-do-well-educated. who has dabbled in a dozen New Delhi criminal schemes has also worked as a model, worked in movies, as an extra, worked in fashion, and does a little jiggle-o sex work from time to time to pay the bills when something else doesn't come along. Now he's entering into some sort of partnership with Charles,

or Olayne Gaultier, as he knows him, and the two men are inseparable. From this point on, Canada House becomes crowded with a passing parade of visitors, all potential customers, and the coffee table is usually littered with white paper packages of gym. ashtrays and coffee cups. On October 15th, 1975, Charles NAAJ, they bring home an American girl now, Teresa Nolton.

As soon as she walked in the door with her big smile and sat down on their cane sofa, it was as though she had brought a party into the room with her. She'd already made some friends in the area, a young couple from Amsterdam who had been on the hippie road for seven months. Cornelia Hemker, known as cocky, which I love. I love this woman's name is cocky. A tall, quiet girl with beautiful blue eyes, flowing fair hair. She was with her boyfriend of five years. Hank Bumtans.

Hank has an Indonesian mother, a Dutch father, and this group likes to go out drinking and to sex clubs. Fucking swingers. Hail Lusufina. Three days later, an old man came across the dead body of a young woman in a yellow floor bikini in a Thai pool. Unfortunately, it is Teresa Nolden.

This is Charles' first known victim. Much later, Charles will confess to knowing Teresa will check in to the Malaysia Hotel and he had sent AJ, his henchman, Ajay, excuse me, Chowdhry, to pick her up with all his talk of cheap gems. After the visit to his flat, Teresa had been delighted to accept his invitation

to join him for a weekend at Patea, another city in Thailand, or Patea, excuse me, he said they went swimming and she drowned. He did not admit to her murder, but investigators are convinced that, yeah, he poisoned her. October 27th, Charles brings home another guest. His name is Vitali,

but people just refer to him as the Turk. Two more young people become residents of Kennet House the next month in mid-November of 1975. There are Canadian tourists. We don't know their names, but they started having real bad stomach problems. Charles was supposedly helping them with when he was likely poisoning them.

November 29th, a group of laborers walking along a road near the Siam Country Club golf course, a few miles outside of the beach resort of Patia, came across the grisly sight of a smoldering human body, most of it ashes, a scrap-a-shirt is the only bit of clothing left unburned and it was Turk. Canadian's probably already dead and now Turk is dead.

The night before Charles and Ajah had gone out with him. They drugged him and laid him down in the back of the car where Ajay handcuffed him to the bottom of the seat. With Ajay's help, Charles unagged Turk, dragged him into a field where he broke his neck, laid rags all over him, doused him everything with gas, and set him on fire. And now, a downstairs neighbor of Kennet House,

Nadine starts to get suspicious about Elaine and Monique and all the where they're going. Charles is getting greedy and reckless. He's encountering potential victims on a near nightly basis in bars and clubs and other places where tourists congregate, cultivating multiple romantic relationships simultaneously, drugging and robbing people just with increasing frequency. Lots of people are disappearing. On December 8th, Cornelia Kaki Hemker and Hank Bumptans, who had left Bangkok for a few weeks, returned, move into Kennet House, start having some stomach problems, the same problems many of those around Charles seem to now have.

week later December 15th Stephanie Perry A friend of the now dead Turk arrived at Canot House after previously receiving letters from Charles Nadine greets her as she comes into the building and then notes that she disappeared the very next day Stephanie never seen alive again The Dutch couple from Amsterdam

Corneli and Hank they leave Canott House the next day and maybe not voluntarily On December 16th there witness being half carried half dragged down the service stairs and shoved into Charles's car He and a J. Drive away with their maybe conscious bodies after midnight do not return until it's almost dawn when they come back they are alone their pants are wet and muddy uh the first thing charles does when he enters his apartment is to strip off his

pants tell dominique to have them cleaned immediately dominique smelled the odor of gasoline on them but asked no questions and did as he was ordered two days later the december 18th edition of the bangkok Post carried a front page article with a particularly grisly photograph. The account reported that a young Australian couple, they should have been Dutch, not Australian, they got that part wrong initially, had been found murdered, strangled and burned in a ditch alongside Highway 58 kilometers south of Bangkok. After being strangled, Corley was also smashed in the head with a board before being drenched with gasoline and set on fire in the most fucked up part about their deaths.

The strangulations had not killed them. and the flames investigators determined they writhed around and reached out for one another. Dear God. Four days later, on December 22nd, Nadine stopped by Kenneth House and found that Monique, Elaine, and Ajay had all headed out to Kathmandu a few days prior, right after those murders. Charles and Murray André, they used the Dutch couple's passports to enter Nepal, so that's shady. They were passed themselves off as gem dealers, had made friends with a group of two girls and a guy, also left Dominique. and another French guest named Yanik behind. Yanuk confessed to Nadine that he had suspicions about who Elaine really was.

He told her he's a thief and a robber and a murderer. He kills people. He'll probably kill us and maybe you if he finds out that you know what I'm telling you. He reminded Nadine about the sudden disappearance of Teresa, the American girl, the disappearance of Vitali, the Turk, Khakim, the disappearance of Stephanie Perry, who had come looking for her lover. Lastly, there was the Dutch couple. Hank Bumtans, Cornelia Kaki Hemker.

Finally, he showed Nadine a passport. own. For more than a month, Dominique had been badgering Elaine to return it to him. When he did, pages were missing. New pages from somebody else's passport had been added. Crudely drawn entrance and exit visas to Thailand had been entered. Apparently, somebody else was using it. Nadine then loaned Dominique and Yanik the money they needed to return to France. Man, nice lady, while Elaine was away. But now Nadine is afraid for her safety. That same day, a Nepalese child and his small dog came across another burning body near Kathmandu. A rumor quickly started that the body was in Americans.

A consulate agent went and took photographs and detailed notes on the body, then another body was found burning near Kathmandu. In time, it will come to light. These are the bodies of two of Charles' new friends. Canadian Lorraine Carrier and American Connie Joe Bronsage. Connie Joe was in her early 20s from California. Her letters home, which her family would later share with investigators and journalists, revealed a very thoughtful young woman engaged in a genuine questioning about the meaning of life.

the nature of consciousness, a true spiritual seeker, a deep soul. She'd written about some meditation practices. She was learning from conversations with Buddhist monks and Hindu teachers about the challenges and rewards of solo travel and about feeling that she was discovering

parts of herself that had been dormant during her conventional life in California. Connie's encounter with Charles certainly followed the same pattern he'd established with many recent victims. He presented himself as somebody who could, you know, enhance her experience of Nepal, who possessed insider knowledge

about temples to visit or what meditation teachers to seek out. Somebody who understood both the Western perspective and the Nepali context well enough to serve as a cultural bridge. He had taken advantage of her kind, generous, and trusting nature, and fucking killed her. Laurent, in his mid-20s, had been traveling through Asia for several months. He had reached Nepal with the same mixture of spiritual curiosity and adventurous enthusiasm that characterized a lot of young travelers of that era in that area. He came from Quebec, from a French-speaking Canadian background that made him perhaps particularly susceptible to Sobrage's charm when Sobrage's present. himself is a sophisticated French Obisnusement

Operated in Indonesia After their murders, Charles and Marie-Andre use Connie Joe and Lorenz passports to get back to Thailand. On December 28, 1975 now, and this shit has happened fast. Some police who have been investigating the dead bodies made some progress.

They found witnesses who described Charles and Marie-Andre they found where they were staying, but when they raided the hotel looking for Charles, they found the couple had already bounced and left without checking out or paying their bill,

as was Charles's fashion. When they returned to Canada House, Charles was pissed to learn that Dominique and Yanuk had split. Nadine worried he was going to be suspicious. Nadine said that when she delivered the news to Charles, he freaked out, yelling that can't be.

She said, he said, they had no passports, no money, they needed me, they loved me. They were my family. I will find them. I will find them and I will learn the truth. They were my family. They loved me. That's pretty telling. He was so desperate to be loved by a family, in such an unrealistic way

and also hated family so much. Right? He's recreating his childhood in such a fucked up way. He's befriending people, getting them to adore him, trying to get him to love him, while also abusing and murdering them when it's convenient and profitable. Law enforcement begins to further connect tourist deaths in January of 1976 in the area.

Mostly thanks to the work of a Dutch diplomat named Hermann Nippenberg, smart guy fluent in several languages, working on a long-distance PhD from John Hopkins University in the U.S. in political science, very hardworking, tenacious, to the point of being a nuisance. During the first week of January, Charles Sebrage escorted Mourgianz, Oge, and a new acquaintance down these steep, slippery steps of agate, the stone ledge beside the river used for religious rituals.

You know, you've seen pictures, I'm sure, of these kind of places where hundreds of pilgrims, mostly women will cautiously, modestly lower their bodies into the cold, sulfurous, smelling waters. This new man, police will soon learn. A young Israeli named Avani Jacobs, thin bearded man, a student in his mid-20s, interested in Eastern religions, nursing vague intentions of writing a book that will contrast these with Judaism. Another curious spiritual seeker looking for a guy, for someone to help him avoid being taken advantage of. And that will not work out, of course.

On January 6th, a maid entered the hotel room where Avani Jacobs was staying sprawled naked across his cot. The Israeli's neck bore ugly purple marks. He had been drugged and strangled. his credentials and valuables missing. Little was left save a few pages of his notebooks, one of which contained an eerie final entry. I would like to stay in Veronnesi until I understand more.

Every exit is an entrance. If one believes strongly enough, life can be lived without fear of death. Here one can almost touch what is hidden, what is beyond. Yeah, that's his final entry. Meanwhile, Nadine feeling tremendous guilt for not already having gone to the police,

She was worried about approaching the Thai police as a French woman, so now her husband puts her in touch with a British diplomat who agreed to hear her concerns. He listened, but with obvious skepticism and disbelief, made what she deemed to be a few cursory notes, and that was it. But he would send a report to the Thai police, but nothing would come of it. Despite one key line that should have caught somebody's attention that said allegedly Gautier, in the course of his jewel business, would frequent the lesser-known hotels in Bangkok, picking up young persons whom he would discover had travelers' checks, Befriend them on the pretext of helping them buy gemstones, take them back to his flat where he would whine and dine them, invite them to stay, and ultimately extract their money and valuables,

disposing of them in the manner of the Dutch couple, as in drugging them and killing them. January 7th, Charles and his current companions arrived in Goa, the former Portuguese colony on the lower and western coast of India. Within hours, Charles zeroed in on three young Frenchmen who were touring the countryside in a van. Dude just does not waste time. Once you got a taste for killing people he stole from,

just there's no cooling off period. Charles slipped away, about a quart of scotch whiskey, an expensive indulgence in India that cost 40 bucks or more at that time, which was a lot. He got all three men drunk right on me, fellas. 36 hours later, they woke up in a hospital somewhere in the south of India, frightening and confused with their heads aching and their memories foggy. Their van they would soon learn had been totally destroyed,

all their personal belongings, luggage, cameras, radios, passports, money, all that's gone. So is a nice French couple and the Indian man, whom they had met three days earlier in the brick market. They were lucky to be alive. It's believed that three unconscious use were tossed into the back of the van, then somebody started up the vehicle, reached the speed of 60 miles an hour,

placed a rock on the gas pedal, and then leaped out. Holy shit, like a fucking movie. It appears that the van was supposed to just drive off of this cliff that would send it tumbling down the rocks into the sea below, certainly kill everybody inside, but the driverless vehicle swerved and smashed into a palm tree instead of violent collision that the drug Frenchman didn't even hear or feel.

nearby villagers heard it though they ran over to the scene and pulled the unconscious victims from the wreckage and saved their lives and Charles already trying to get creative with his murders now per usual Charles and Cruz stole these guys' passports

and used them for themselves to enter Singapore I don't understand how he was doing this either no one fucking checked passport photos back then or I guess like he did mention once before they would just like cut out photos and put him onto these new passports that must be what they were doing

Charles left Marie Andre alone there for a week now. A diary entry of hers from this time reads, day after day a small piece of myself is taken out of me. Day after day I am hurt. I am destroyed little by little, but I'm still on my way, even though I fell in a ditch. I still have hope, and this hope is the only thing I have, and I must hold onto it tightly. If Charles succeeds in taking me out of this ditch

and puts me again on the road, I shall live. If Charles walks on my side and helps me to stay on the road, then I shall go very far, and I shall regain my happiness. He is the only man who can help me, for I love him so much that I can make only one being with him. I can only exist because of him. I can only breathe because of him. And my love is increasing. Okay, so they're quite a pair.

They're kind of made for each other. He, she's the fucking female Pebulaeepaupu, apparently. You-hoo rabbit. Sauté vu, soté vu, wherever you are. Flit. February 20th, 1976. Dutch diplomat Hermann Nippenberg sitting in an office at the Thai police headquarters

talking to senior officers. He's taken the death of the two Dutch tourists very seriously. Doesn't feel local police are doing the same. He's not happy. When Hermon left the office that morning, though, he was reassured that two top-ranking police officials were personally involved now,

that the crime suppression unit investigating was an elite unit of the Thai police with many of its officers having been trained by Scotland Yard. When he returned to his office shortly after night, he found a thick envelope on his desk marked personal and confidential. He told his secretary to keep out any visitors, closed the door, began reading a report titled Double Murder on the Road to Ayutia State of Investigation. This remarkable document contained a detailed description of Elaine Gautier of 504,

Kennet House, and a crazy amount of detailed evidence. The notes from Nadine's report finally made it to somebody who really cared and had some juice. Hermann reached out to Nadine. She agreed to help him now any way she could. Speaking to Nadine, a few weeks later, March 11th, Marie-Andre called her up and invited her to come shopping, saying that Elaine had told her she could go back to Canada in a day or two. And she wanted Nadine's help and shopping for some gifts to bring back. After she got out the phone, Nadine rushed to the Dutch embassy to tell Herman.

He was stunned. Were these people going to just fucking come back home and just walk right into their trap? He called the Crime Suppression Bureau, got through to General Sui, and told him what was happening, and a raid was planned. The next day on March 12, seven Thai officers ride the elevator to the fifth floor of Canada House ready to burst through the door if need. needed. A few blocks away in his office at the Dutch embassy, Hermann waits staring at the phone. Turns out no busting to the door would be needed. Doors wide open. When the officers rushed in with guns drawn at approximately 4 p.m., they encountered a scene of domestic tranquility. In a chair, Mori André was reading philosophy. Nearby, Charles is sitting at the kitchen counter working

on his jewelry. Oge is standing nearby looking totally relaxed and sexy. For the next three hours, the raiding party turned Charles's apartment upside down, scattering papers, stripping bed linens, pulling pots from the kitchen shelves, etc. Marie Andre, sobbing, and Charles is protesting the barbaric and illegal raid demanding to see a search warrant. At 7 p.m., the police take the suspects

in a portable safe to their headquarters. The safe was, they weren't able to get it open on site. No one remembered to call Hermann until 10 p.m. For six hours, he was just in his office, Stu and staring at the phone. Finally gets a call where a Thai officer explains, oh, there was a mix-up. the man Hermann said was Elaine Gutier

turned out to be this American guy Herman asked that they found what they found in the raid and they said not much Herman questioned how they knew he was American and the officer insisted well they checked his passport and Hermon is pissed off he's like all this guy does is fucking steal passports all he does is deal in stolen identities

the officer lends Hermon know that they're releasing the three the next day or until the next day excuse me they had agreed to return for interviews Herman's losing his mind he's convinced no they're just going to leave officer tells him, no, that's not going to happen. They promise they'd come back.

And we have their passports. Man, some people are just not very smart. Next day to the diplomat's surprise, though, on March 13th, Charles does reappear. As ordered, the next morning, police headquarters, and Marie Andre and Ajay are by his side. In front of them, a police locksmith breaks open their small safe and it is empty. Charles is nodding, rising to his feet. I imagine saying some of the effective, I told you. Then he asked, could he go now?

I have an important lunch meeting to get to. and he impatiently tapped on his gold watch. They were just about to let that motherfucker go, but then an American, Sam Anson from the DEA, the drug enforcement agency, strolled into the Crime Suppression Bureau's office, looked at Charles's passport, told the other officers,

nope, this is not real. This is fake. It was altered. They got him. But then, these fucking idiots lose him just literally a few minutes later. Charles, Marie Andre, and OJ are told to sit down on a bench in the police station and await next steps.

They're not handcuffed. No one is assigned. closely watch them. And so they're just like, oh yeah, okay, no problem. And then a few minutes later, when no one's looking, they just get up and walk out

and immediately flee the country. Unreal. Hermann, Beyond Furious, and at insult to injury, he also gets in trouble at work for overstep and his duties trying to help get Charles arrested.

No one besides Hermann and Nadine seemed to really care about Charles and his possible crimes at this point. The next month, on April 6th, Nadine gets a postcard from Switzerland.

It reads, I didn't forget you, and hope to see you again, soon I hope, my dear Nadine, I will be able to show my gratitude, love, Elaine. Is he trying to fuck her to? Or is this a threat? Is that a message of, I know what you did, you rat it on me, and I'm coming back, I won't forget. Also in April, Charles's crimes are starting to be linked as a connection has now been made between the deaths in Nepal and the deaths in Bangkok, Thailand. Charles and Marie Andre were all over the headlines of various Asian newspapers.

But they don't know that because they're now in Paris. It had taken them three, Three weeks to get from Bangkok to Paris after their escape from police questioning. Charles even picked up another one of his cronies, a Thai gem dealer from Chantiburie, Tommy, along the way. Chantiburie, by the way, small town with a big history in gems. Less than 30,000 people live there, but the town in the area around it has been called the colored gemstone capital of the world. For centuries, ton of quality rubies and sapphires in particular have been mined in this area. And an industry of corresponding jewelers, jewelry makers, gemstone cutters, et cetera, grew up around the mines. Another, and he's all about the gems now.

Another stop on their route to Paris was in Malaysia. There, Ajay was able to acquire a sizable number of gems that Charles was planning to resell in Europe. And this stop, last known siding of Ajay Chaudhry. It is believed that after he got the gems, Charles wanted him to get, knowing that a J had no connections in France. It would not be of any use to him there financially. Charles just killed him. Another stop. This is a guy who's like his fucking buddy, his protege.

Another stop was in Karachi, Pakistan, where Charles and Marie Andre met Mary Ellen Ether, young nurse from Australia, who Charles thought was hot, this 27-year-old. Charles is like the fucking Deseke's guy, the most interesting man in the world. If that guy was also evil, right? I don't always drink beer, but when I do, I guess it be French, right? I don't always drink beer, but when I do, I drink Dosequiz, then I kill someone and set him on fire and take their passport. He tells Marie Ellen that he will call him. on her after his work in Europe is wrapped up.

Just doing that shit right in front of Marie Andre. After that, they make it to Paris where Charles has the balls to visit Felix, the guy he stole the car from, stolen other shit from, burned him after that guy had done so much for him so many times and helped his brother. Felix doesn't tell him to fuck off. He shares in him that Andre, the half-brother Charles, had also fucked over in Greece, or Turkey rather, with that whole let's trade identities bullshit, had been freed from the Turkish prison in what was called a miracle. after only served in a few months, that 18-year sentence for the Istanbul Hilton crimes Andre was pardoned. One of many people pardoned,

one of the first acts of a new government was to order a general amnesty. Holy shit. Guessing he was still a little salty towards Charles, but he will visit Charles later in prison. So you know what? Maybe they patch things up, which is ridiculous. Charles also called upon his former in-laws

when he returned to Paris. I doubt they were happy to hear from him. Found out that his ex-wife and baby mama, Chantal, had remarried, moved to America for a while, but was back in Paris because her mom was dying. Charles scares Chantal, but will ultimately leave her alone. Luckily,

their daughter, the girl Charles had abandoned, was in the U.S. with her now adoptive father. So that's good that he's lost custody. Soon after making it back to France, international law enforcement, finally starting to circle around Charles. Interpol came with the following message to Bangkok on May 19, 19, 1976. The discrete verification

of address Villa La Roach shows that Wong Fung Chun, ex-concubine of Hachand Sobrages is living there. Chun had two children by Sobrage. One of them a son is recorded in our documents under diverse identities, including Charles Sobrage. This hostile individual is known for escaping and is under indictment in France.

It appears that Charles Sobrage took the identity of Gautier, Elaine. This is considered an urgent and grave affair in France. The following day, Bangkok Interpol issues an international warrant of arrest for Elaine Gutier, Marie-Andre Leclair and O'Jie Chowdry, of course, Ajay, very likely dead, for conspiring to murder Teresa, Hank, Kaki, and Vittali, aka the Turk. Two weeks later in June, Charles and Marie-Andre decide to leave France and head back to the east.

They were being driven in a silver citron, a French car, by another associate of Charles, Jean-Dweem. No one has ever had more fucking associates around the world, this evil most interesting man, this evil Austin Powers International Man of Mystery, motherfucker. They stopped in Karachi to pick up Marie-Ellen ether.

It's so tricky to bounce from so many different nationalities, all the name and pronations. The 27-year-old Australian nursing student, he wanted to shag before heading back to Thailand. And also, while sources are not clear regarding if this woman knew Mary Ellen

before they both left with Charles, Charles also managed to convince a 22-year-old woman from the UK, doing some spiritual seeking as well, Barbara Smith, described as a tall, thin, exceptionally attracted brunette to also leave with him. Pretty sure he would end up sleeping with both of these women.

Good God! Two more women who just took up and went with him around the world. Back again in Karachi, Marie-Andre finds a newspaper detailing the search for her and Charles and freaks out. The article contained dates, deaths, and the stomach-churning news that Thai police were preparing murder warrants for the arrest of Alain Gutier and his girlfriend Monique

believed to be a Canadian nurse. Charles apparently doesn't give a fuck, not bothered in the slightest. He just kept on driving to Bombay. There, Charles met another Jean. John Hoyguns, a 45-year-old Belgian, who lived in Goa, who had taken a bus into Bombay to find work as a film extra

because of all the Bollywood ship being filmed there. Another associate, so he just can't be alone. Always has to surround himself with people enamored with him. The boy, his family, didn't want, craves an entourage of sycophants to try and heal the old wound, I guess. Charles quickly brought Jean into the new fold, or into the fold, and New John, and the whole group headed to New Delhi.

By June 11th, New John realized he had fucked up. He'd fallen in with the wrong crew. He's terrified. The Belgian was sitting on the steps of the international telephone exchange while Marie Andre is inside trying to call her parents in Canada.

In the short week, he had been with the group, he quickly realized he's in way over his head. The group had been, of course, working a con. Mary Ellen, excuse me, had been sent in wearing seductive clothes to sit in the lobby of a YMCA hotel, one of the better middle class hotels in the area. Jean is her backup.

Inside, Mary Ellen, Barbara Smith, encountered three young French tourists. They buy them drinks. Once you know it very quickly, they get sick. Then when Mary Ellen gives them some more medicine, they feel worse because it's more poison, and they pass out. And when they were, you know, more drugs.

And when they wake back up, anything they had had on them a value was gone. Charles had convinced yet another person to help him drug and rob strangers. His new recruits just keep repeating this process. Meanwhile, while this is going on, the Thai authorities search for the group is heating up. All of the international press about the murders

has been terrible for tourism. So now the Bangkok police. Now the tourism's taking a hit. Now they're serious about this. And now back to Marie Andre in her phone call, home to Canada, while Jean is waiting for her. He's around all these women. He noticed Marie Andre's purse,

which had been left on the counter with her request that Hoygens watch over it. Now Jean decides he can't continue drugging and robbing people. He can't be part of a jewel heist like they're planning. He needs to get the fuck out, but he doesn't have money. So he snatches Marie Andre's purse, which contained $150.50 in cash, four passports, always passports, a gold chain, a watch, and he ran. He returned to their room in the Lodi Hotel where he scoops up everything he can grab and put into a suitcase.

A couple more $100, camera, radio, assorted valuables, flees New Delhi heading home to Goa. When Charles finds out, he's, of course, furious. Anyone double-crossing this habitual double-crosser stings badly to him, right? He's extra emotional because it hurts him right where it hurt when his family abandoned him. he flies with another associate named John There's no shortage of John's Right this is Jean Dweem Immediately Togo spends two frustrating days

Searching for traitor John But doesn't find him However, when he comes back Charles gets another He gets a fucking third He gets Jean-Trey Third John There's a lot of Johns

Floating around this part of the world This guy is Jean-Luc Jean-Luc Solomon A French traveler visiting New Delhi By offering him Barbara Smith Just pimps Barbara out for the night he's part pimp, part cold leader, part serial killer, part jewel thief,

part international man of mystery. Charles takes Jean-Luc, Barbara, and Mary Ellen to dinner where he recommends chicken curry when it comes back. He sneaks a vial of clear liquid into Solomon's portion. Jean-Luc gets groggy, starts stumbling. Then the foursome head back to the hotel where Jean-Luc expects to sleep

with Barbara, instead slips into a coma. Jean-Luc Solomon discovered two mornings later, naked and sprawled out on the balcony of his room, clinging to life by a thread. He is taken to the hospital little bit is too late, he will die. Another bird of victim. Within days, on July 2nd, Charles and his group are in the historic Indian city of Agri now.

This dude was everywhere. Things are tense in the group. Marie Andre has been an emotional wreck since she had learned there was a warrant out for her arrest for fucking murder. Charles is edgy. His normally confident facade is cracking. The group is in town because Mary Ellen and Barbara have been out looking for new tourists to rob and possibly kill when they learned that a large group of French tourists were in town heading to see the Taj Mahal. Charles, of course, wants to charm himself and graciate himself into the group.

He's relentless, nonstop crime. Charles finds him, introduces himself now as Daniel Shomey. His mission, he said, was to make their stay in India a memorable one. Not lying about that. He'll deliver. He will spend three days taking the group all around and playing host. Meanwhile, former Jean-Ans'on associate, Jean Hoygens, is feeling guilty about his exploits in the group. He mails the letter detailing Charles' actions to the Canadian embassy.

He was Belgian, so why contact the Canadians? I don't fucking know. A lot of the story doesn't make sense in moments. But that's what happens in the sources. July 5th, 1976 is the French tour groups last day in India. At 2 a.m., the tourists, they're supposed to catch a red eye flight to Bangkok. Shameh begins telling them, you know, hours before this, how dangerous it is in Thailand, how easy to catch various diseases in the Far East, you know, how these tender French stomachs can easily fall victim to exotic

bacterias. Did their tour director know about the recent severe outbreak of dysentery in Thailand? While they're all at this farewell cocktail party and traditional Indian dinner in the restaurant of the hotel they're staying at, Charles announces, you know what, I'll help you guys out. I got some medicine for you to take with you for the rest of your journeys. He offers it to his friends. You know, he's a great guy. Tells him it is guaranteed to save them from intestinal agonies. Approximately 20 of the French tourists, take him up on his generous offer.

You know, they accept the pills. he takes out of his little black bag, pop him into their mouths right there on the spot. The plan was for the drugs to hit them, Charles's plan, by the time they returned to the rooms after dinner, where they would then pass out, and Charles and Nuzon, and the rest of his crew, would rob them.

But he miscalculated the dosage, gave him too much, suddenly in the middle of dinner, shake its fucking wild. Quote, a woman screamed. Beside her, a student had pitched forward into his wine glass. Another suddenly slumped in his chair, sliding out and onto the floor like a blob of gelatin. people began to vomit.

For a stunning few seconds, no one grasped what was happening. Bodies fell. A man grabbed the tablecloth as he lost consciousness. Plates crashed around him. They're all dying. Someone screamed. Get the manager, yelled someone else. The wife of the tour director fell to her knees, began to tend to the fallen. Then she screamed, poison, assassins.

It's fucking bedlam. When the manager ran into the room, he threw his hands to his face and horror. Someone quickly put it together that only the people who had taken Daniel Shulmes, his pills, were passing out. and now several men grabs Chameh. But Mr. fucking karate broke loose. Started to run madly about the room, stopping to threaten his pursuers with karate chops,

trying to find the exit. It's fantastic. It's like a B movie. Three of the French students dramatically tackle him, flying through the air, while they grab his arms and legs, others jump in and sit on him in the Pandemonium,

Associate Nuzon, Jean-Dweem. He fled. I think he's new John. There's a lot of Johns. I'm losing track. He leaps into Charles'clock. car screeches away at high speed. He might be OG Jean.

When the police arrived, they discovered Charles Sobranche, pinned to a chair by several strong male students, struggling, cursing, threatening everyone around him. He throws a fucking fit. He's screaming to be released. There's been a huge misunderstanding he claims. He's a French citizen. He's a well-connected businessman. Oh, he's going to sue the hotel. He's going to

sue the police. He's going to sue the students who've just assaulted him. Oh, I will own you all. You're all going to prison. That kind of shit. Fortunately, this time, no one cares. Nobody believes him. Then Deputy Superintendent Police Officer, Naranda Nats Tully, walked into the room. Tully apparently thought he was the Sherlock Holmes of India. He'd been solving crimes in New Delhi for 30 years, had a very impressive record, wanted to nail Charles Chabrage, nice feather in his cap.

This is the kind of case that could send his career out on a very high note, you know, earn him some more money. He loosened the suspect's belt, lifted his shirt, told the other officers in the room, five years ago this man had escaped from a hospital in New Delhi after an appendix operation. He had been clutching the wound when they caught him Toil he examined the scar, it fit. He told him, you are Charles Subrage, and you are under arrest for murder. That's pretty fucking sick. I love it.

What about the rest, though? Well, after Charles was arrested, Mary Ellen, that Australian nurse. She took charge of the other. She moved the group to a third-class dump near Cannot circle this big commercial district, insists that everybody stay put. Take a break from the poisoning people, all right? Okay. Okay.

Marie Andre, didn't like that plan. She wanted to flee to Canada. But before she could, less than 48 hours after Charles had been arrested, Marie-Andre, Mary Ellen, and Barbara also arrested by Tully's men. Marie-Andre almost immediately tells the officers she's glad it's over. She signs a 32-page detailed statement very soon after this that began with her life in Canada, continued through her fateful meeting with her lover, Charles Joubrage, with Pepe,

the romantic lake of Kashmir on Kashmir or in Kashmir. Charles, meanwhile, he's been under non-stop questioning, but he won't break. By July 16th, he's now been under interrogation for 10 days. Still won't break. 32-year-old dude, a very experienced bullshit artist. Extremely confident conman. Tully gets worried.

He's going to be released because he still hasn't legally proved he is Charles Sobrosh. Tully brought in the doctor who had operated on him in 1971. That guy was like, I don't know, maybe he is, maybe not. Tully tried bringing in the three women he was with to point fingers at Charles. They won't. They're too afraid of him. Tully then re-read the file that had been put together by Hermann Nippenberg decided to try a different tactic.

Flattery played his ego. Tully starts to compliment him on his strength, his endurance. He pays respect, right? Butteres him up, and it works. The detective wonders, is flattery going to accomplish what everything else, you know, has not? Tully positions himself as a father figure to Charles, praise on his daddy issues.

That works. He puts his arm around Charles, tells him shit like a man he has never. question anybody as smart as this guy. Talks about how easy it must be for a man as handsome as himself, as smart and accomplished as worldly to bend others

to his will. And eventually walking daddy issues Charles Sobrage confesses. Then Charles, Marie, Andre, Leclair, Barbara Smith, Mary Ellen, they're all sent to Har, this maximum security prison complex located in New Delhi. Charles and

associates, they were arrested in the time of Misa, the maintenance of Internal Security Act in India. This applied to all prisoners, even non-political ones, and it meant that those accused of murder could be held up to two years without bail, without trial, under harrowing conditions. Marie-Andre, LeClair, Charles, they're classified as C prisoners under Mesa, the severest, lowest category, entitled to nothing but a food ration

just big enough to barely sustain life. Marie-Andre struggles, very depressed. Charles, though, he's an old pro with prison. No stranger to incarceration, he adjusts quickly and smoothly. some sources claim he smuggled a bunch of gemstones into the prison in his ass or possibly by swallowing them and shitting him out like a fucking mule and now he has currency within days he has arranged a network of flunkies more associates inside the prison and out people are bringing him food running his errands contacting lawyers smuggling in shit normally not allowed to the lowest class of inmate barbara and mary ellen they're both awarded b classifications because they were state's witnesses agreeing to testify against charles and marie andre despite a little better treatment though, they don't fare well. Both women attempt suicide by overdosing,

but both will live. In May of 1982, an Indian court will convict both Charles and Marie, Andre, Charles found guilty of the murder and robbery of Israeli tourists Avani Jacobs sentenced to life imprisonment.

Leclair found guilty of drugging those French students, then decides to appeal her judgment after being, or before sentencing, and is granted a release from prison on the condition that she could not leave the country. And then a year later in July of 1983, she will be diagnosed with ovarian

cancer and will be permitted to return to Canada for medical treatment, which will not work, and she will die on April 20th, 924 at the age of 38. Also, in 83, Charles's murder conviction is overturned on appeal due to a lack of evidence, but he is then

found guilty of drugging that big group of French tourists as well and sentenced to a dozen years in prison. The other two, Barbara and Mary, they're released from Tihar prison, pardon for any offenses connected to the case, because of their witnessing, you know, testimony. Fucking crazy.

So they go on with their lives. In the spring of 1986, Charles finds out he's going to be eligible for release in 1989 because he accumulated a bunch of good behavior credits. Dude made a lot of friends inside, lived it up. Supposedly, he got himself one of the nicest cells, had a TV in it,

living on gourmet food, hosting journalists for prison interviews, talking about selling his life rights for movies, getting conjugal visits, literally throwing parties in his cell, you know, whether he had fucking drinking wine and shit. This guy, I don't know how he does it. Did not want to be released, though, in 1989,

because Thailand was still maintaining active arrest warrants for him in connection with murders he had committed in Bangkok and Pitya in 1975. Those crimes carried the possibility of the death penalty. But also, there was a two-decade statute of limitations, meaning if he could just stay in prison until at least late 1995, he could not be tried for those crimes.

The authorities repeatedly requested his extradition from India. India had refused those requests during his active imprisonment on the principled grounds that countries should not extradite individuals to face capital punishment while they are serving sentences. But once his sentence was up, yeah, they were happy to send him over there. So he's fucking sweating it. So March 11th, 196, he does something to get a sentence extended. Or at least, you know, either get a sentence extended or get away with everything in true Charles style.

throws a big party under the guise of his 42nd birthday coming up. In advance to this party, he built up a huge stockpile of sedatives, chloral hydrate, and madazepam to arrange a mass incapitation, or incapacitation. Massing, he's going to fucking get him, you know, passed out, he's going to cut all their fucking heads off. That would be more dramatic, no incapacitation. He had the drugs carefully hidden in sweets.

He passed around. I can't believe this is real. By the time anybody recognized they had been drugged, the sedatives had progressed far enough that any effective resistance or communication with any authorities outside, the immediate area was futile. Once everybody started getting real sleepy, Sabrage and four accomplices who helped him with this, they just walked out wearing civilian clothes they had smuggled in. The escape, not discovered for several hours. This is documented. This is crazy this happened. After a few

weeks, Charles was recaptured, though. Some sources say that that's what he wanted. Others say he was trying to sneak onto a boat head into the U.S., where he was then going to track down his ex-wife and daughter. When he got arrested, he was in a fancy restaurant and go chowing down at a bunch of expensive seafood. Fucking this guy. He was charged and convicted of drugging guards, escaped from custody, sentenced to an additional 10 years in 1987, which was perfect. In February of 97, Charles Sobrage, now free at the age of 52, unable to be prosecuted in Thailand. Insane. After all that, he's free. He returns to France, where he lives as a sort of quasi-celebrity, charging big sums of money for interviews and photographs,

making business deals. According to one source, he sold the rights of a film based on his life for millions of dollars. He's in great shape. Looked young for his age. Got a lot of girlfriends. He's fucking rich. It's all legal.

He's living on Easy Street. But he fucks it up in 2003 by visiting Nepal. If he just would have stayed away from that part of the world, he'd be fine. But he shows up in Kathmandu to set up some kind of mineral business, water business there. traveled on his French passport under his own name, makes no effort to conceal his identity, thinks all the shit's behind him, it's not, different country, he had done dirty shit in with

the different statute of limitations. He's arrested September 19, 2003, in connection with the 1975 murders of young American woman Connie Joe Bronsic and young French Canadian man, Loran Carrier, we just kind of briefly mentioned them, charges that carried potential life sentences in Nepal. And on August of 2004, the court found Charles Sobrage guilty of the murder of one of those people, of Connie, Joe Bronsage, and he's sentenced to life. This motherfucker had it fucking made, and he ruined it.

But he will get out of jail again. Due to failing health and expensive health care needs, Charles given humanitarian release from Nepal in 2022. The Supreme Court there announced December 21st that he was going to be released and deported to France. He is officially released two days later, flies back to Paris on his own on a commercial flight at the age of 78,

He doesn't look like he was that sick. Living as a free French citizen now, when interviewed upon his arrival in France, he referred to himself as the serpent, right, that name given to him years earlier for being snaky and hard to catch, and he said, quote, I have a lot to do.

I have to sue a lot of people. And while I'll add a little bit more before we're done here today, that will take us out of this timeline. Good job, soldier. You've made it back. Barely. This guy, the surrogue.

The serpent, Charles Sabrage, man of many names, given and taken. What a slippery son of a bitch. So hard to capture, so hard to keep in prison. Could charm the pants off for just about anybody, apparently. Always on the go. Always running a scam ever since he was a kid. And while I do hold him to blame, ultimately, for all of his adult actions, would he have been this way if his bio dad would have accepted him from the very beginning and remaining in his life?

I doubt it. And we'll never know, but I doubt it. It seems like so much of his motivation as an adult was to charm people into loving him to thinking he was so cool, so handsome and smart, right? For a guy who presented it being so confident, he was actually so insecure, so needy. It's just constantly seeking validation, looking for a new lady to love him,

a new associate to be his lackey, to prove himself again with another heist or whatever. And then he so quickly rejected, you know, the people that, you know, adored him and burned those who tried to help him, probably subconsciously to play an armchair therapist here, so they couldn't reject him first like his dad did, like mom did in moments.

like everybody did eventually because he used everybody and treated him like shit. Man, what a shame. He clearly had a lot of talent. If he had applied it in a productive way, man, what could this dude have accomplished? I imagine he could have been a wildly successful in a number of different fields. But he never looked inward, hard enough and long enough to get to the bottom of his shit and really change. Just wouldn't risk being vulnerable, I guess. And he built a wall around his sensitive soul, became a serpent.

Guy who swindled an untold number of people damaged countless lives to abandon his own child, even more than he had been abandoned, a guy who has been convicted of tumors, confessed at 10, estimated to have killed as many as 31, and a guy is still living free in France right now. Let's go over a bit of what we learn now and learn something new in today's takeaways.

Time shock. Top five takeaways. Number one, citizenship. Charles Sobrage was born at the tail end of the existence of French Indochina. And due to the timing of France leaving the country, his dad not being willing to initially claim him as his son, his stepdad not being willing to give him his surname,

and moving around a ton in his early years, he did not have legal citizenship in any country and would not get it until he was around 25 years old, like just before he turned 25. Number two, Charles Sobrage literally been a lifelong criminal. He was committing crimes with other kids before he was 10 years old, just got out of his latest stint in prison when he was 78 and 2022, probably running some kind of scam right now.

Number three, his half-brother Andrei. Charles convinced his younger half-brother to switch identities with him in a Turkish prison, then left him to serve an 18-year prison sentence without ever looking back. True sociopath shit. Number four, Charles lied about, or lies, excuse me, almost as frequently as he breathed. In 19792 alone, he presented himself as Dr. Jalian Clare, Charles Sounder, Adolf Nomer, Dr. Marshall Golihan and Salim Herdy. He represented himself to be everything from a professor of classical literature at the Sorbonne,

to an Arabian oil sheik. And number five, new info, back in 2008 when Charles was 64, that charming fuck got engaged to a 20-year-old French interpreter for his lawyer, Nehita Biswas, when it looked like he might get out of prison on an appeal in Nepal early. She said their large age gap did not matter. I am mature enough to decide for myself. Age does not make a difference. Well, when he stayed in prison, she left.

It doesn't appear that they're still together. But who is he love bombing now? I am guessing that horny old goat has not stopped being Pepe Lepew at the age of 82. Time suck. Top five takeaways. The serpent.

Serial killer Charles Sobrage has been sucked. Who has a wild ride? Thanks to the bad magic team for helping to make them time suck. Thanks to Queen of Bad Magic, Lindsay Cummins. Give me the space to create these episodes. Thanks to Logan Keith helping to publish these episodes and designing merch for the store

at bad magic productions.com. Thank you to Heather Rylinder for her thorough research this week. Also thanks to the All Seen Eyes, moderating the Colt of the Curies, private Facebook page, the Mod Squad, making sure Discord keeps running smooth, and everybody over in the TimeSug Subreddit and Bad Magic Subreddit. And now let's head on over to this week's Time Sucker Updates.

Our first update this week that was sent in to Bojangles at Timesugpodcast.com came in from a smart fucking sack, David C. Quirose, who wrote him the subject line of Response to Strictor gun laws in episode 518 Hi Dan and the time-sug team I hope all as well with you meet Sacks this week I just listened to episode 518 San Ysidro McDonald's Massacre

and I wanted to give you a response to the most pointed argument you made regarding gun control First I want to get out in front of what's about to follow and just tell you that I fully agree with the argument you made I am however going to attempt to play devil's advocate and game out the argument a bit After all I think more conversation discussion is what's needed

As a quick side note have you seen the movie the drama. If not, I highly suggest watching it. It's brutally uncomfortable to sit through, but I think that's the point of it. It directly addresses school shooters, the complexity of America's online extremism in America's gun culture. We often dodge engaging with hard, ugly problems like this because it's painful and not something quickly remedied. The issue of mass shootings needs direct engagement if we're ever going to start to address the madness. Sorry for the short detour, back on track now. In summary, around two hours and 14 minutes into the show, you suggested that stricter gun controls needed and that a sensible solution

could be mental competency exams for gun owners every couple years. They would have to meet with the licensed therapists. If they were deemed unwell enough, they would have their guns taken away from them. Further testing would be required to get them back. Anybody who buys a firearm while on this suspension should go to prison for a long time. Hopefully that summarizes your point succinctly and accurately. I think it does. When I listened to this, I found myself immediately saying, yeah, duh, this is clearly a solution.

We should have been doing for a very long time. But then I tried to think through how this could be abused by an authoritarian, government to disarm otherwise mentally well-regulated and responsible gun owners who happen to just disagree with them. Let us assume we pass federal legislation that implements your proposed solution. Two scenarios come to mind for me. The first is a movement to classify people going through gender dysphoria as mentally ill. The second involves individuals being properly treated for mental illnesses like depression or anxiety with medication such as SSRIs or other self, other safe, well-studied drugs. Did you know that as it stands now, the legal system and the clinical system

define mental illness separately for different purposes, and neither is fully bound by the other. Legally, the government does not have to defer to psychiatrists, and when a statute or a court needs to decide who counts as mentally ill, it uses its own definition, written for its own purpose, and those legal definitions are frequently not the same as any clinical diagnosis. Federal firearms law is a clean example of the legal system writing its own definition of mental illness rather than borrowing the clinical one. The gun ban in 18 U.S.C. 922-G-4, applies to anyone who is, quote, a danger to himself or to others or who lacks the mental capacity to contract or manage his own affairs, as determined by a court, board, commission, or other lawful authority. Now, where does it ask for a DSM diagnosis.

Now imagine a federal agency regulating all gun owners with highly pointed politicized questionnaires to fill out in background checks to decide for themselves as someone is mentally ill. Even if they use a licensed psychiatrist to evaluate gun owners, precedent shows they do not need to base it. the decision there. The law would need to explicitly require that certain diagnoses by licensed psychiatrists be found or as found in the DSM are automatic bans and that the regulatory body not only has to honor them, but they cannot decide for themselves. Despite my best efforts, I did not sink your ship, but hopefully it shows how good ideas can be weaponized. There is much more I can write about this topic, but I'll just leave you with this. As you rightly stated, there are an estimated 400 million firearms in the U.S. is actually 400 to 500 million firearms. Yeah,

I truly wonder if we could successfully regulate and enforce gun laws across the country, and against what would be certain friction in red states, maybe even shootouts as guns get confiscated, just as the war on drugs largely failed, turning the clock back on the explosion of gun ownership in America might prove impossible, especially with the advent of 3D printed ghost guns. Yet I remain resolved that we must do something.

We don't have to sit idly by as our children are murdered in the classrooms meant to prepare them for the future. We don't have to be desensitized to the gore that runs across our phones or TV seemingly every week, And we certainly shouldn't have to keep in the back of our heads the fear that the next concert we go to, or our kids' recital for fuck's sake, or just sending them off to school might be our last moments on earth before meeting a terrifying, violent end. Thoughts and prayers are not enough. We have to try something. Best, David C. Quiroz. P.S., what are your thoughts on the counterintuitive argument of more guns as a solution to this?

The good guy with the gun theory. That's the main argument I continually hear from the right, and they loudly praise the times when a citizen intervenes. Just recently this happened in Twin Falls. at a local in and out, yep, where an armed citizen shot at and forced the gunmen to move away from the crowd. Well, David, that was very well written. Thanks for sending that in.

Yeah, and thanks to a lot of gun owners who also pointed out, and respectively, in every single instance, how my argument does not work for one reason or another. Admittedly, I don't have an answer, and I wish I did. And David, I'll start at the end. I don't think that greatly increase

in the amount of guns in the populace will reduce gun-related deaths overall. I think that for every case of somebody shooting a mass shooter like, you know, what happened in Twin Falls, of like scaring them off, there will be, I fear, more cases of more mass shooters if there's just more, you know, guns. That being said, like you pointed out, can we reverse the clock? No. You know, gun culture in the U.S., it isn't actually equivalent to the gun culture of any other country. Could we actually get most of the most dangerous guns out of the most dangerous hands? I don't know.

I really don't. will we ever get all the fentanyl and equally dangerous drugs off the street, right? Maybe not, probably not. It is fucking complicated. Like you, like everybody who wrote in, we do all want to fix it. I love seeing that.

Everybody, you know, wants to fix it. Nobody wants more psychopaths out there, you know, doing more shootings and more children dying. I would argue that nobody fucking hates smash shooting is more than responsible gun owners, you know, which is the overwhelming majority of gun owners.

I haven't seen the drama. Thanks for that recommendation. I do also fantasize about hope that maybe some hopefully soon to emerge futuristic tech, some black mirror shit could make guns obsolete in public places like schools at least, you know, some kind of like, I don't know, tech that would send out a powerful signal that would drop everybody to the area, you know, like some audio signal that just kind of short circuits you,

drops you to the ground, keeps you on the ground until law enforcement arrives, wearing inserts that maybe counteract that specific frequency. I don't know, fucking something. We're going to have to get creative. We're going to have to have a lot of smart people work very hard in this. You know, if there was some magical easy solution where it's like, all right, we just return all these guns and then all of them go away and then it never happens again. That doesn't seem feasible to me. I think, you know, there's so many out there that so many will be hidden.

So many, you can't like, you know, prove that somebody's thing wasn't stolen. People have workarounds. And then the big thing is the 3D printing. That is new terrifying technology. That stuff is just going to advance with AI. It's fucking tricky, but we've got to keep talking about it. And I love all the emails I got from people that were like civil. This fucking shit about knee-jerk reactions,

just in general in society, that doesn't fucking help anything. So I hope we have like more discussions about this and somebody lots smarter than me can figure this shit out. Next up another smart sack. O.G. Sucker, Morgan McCall. Sending a message with the subdued line of, You done fucked up. He was right.

Dan, listen to your short suck 62 about the food system. You done fucked up applying what is true about, say, corn or soy to strawberries. Strawberries are not developed to work with certain pesticides. They are not grown from seed, and the big four are not really involved in strawberry breeding. The biggest strawberry breeders are University of California, University of Florida, Driscolls, and a handful of small companies. Strawberries are grown from clone runners of established varieties that are licensed

from the universities or companies that develop them. Driscoll is the biggest producer. They have their whole top-to-bottom system of production and distribution. If you're actually getting local strawberries rather than mass-produced berries from California, Florida, or Mexico, your local grower probably bought some. some off-patent plants from a nursery, Morgan. Fine, Morgan! How dare you know so much about fucking strawberries?

I guess we can all just live on strawberries, huh? Like rabbits or bears or squirrels. I don't... I didn't take the time to find out what kind of animal eat strawberries before I answer this question. I'm not looking up, not today. Thank you for pointing out that some of the shit at the farmer's market is local.

So that's nice. That's refreshing. It's not all big corporations. Finally, a third super smart sack. Leah Adzolina Leah Adolina Sorry if I'm mispronouncing your name I've had a lot of names pronounced today My brain is fried

Send in a message with the subpline of brains NDE's The Third Man Syndrome I love this How cool is our human brain Dan I was listening to Buffalo River Cold Suck And it spurred me on a rant About how cool is our ridiculous human brain

Oh agreed so hard I'm a biologist And I study human evolution for fun I know nerd alert I love it The human brain is so complex it goes to great lengths to keep us the organism calm and alive. I'm going to pivot, and for argument's sake,

let's say God is not real. That means the majority of human brains have evolved to see a peaceful, loving light, and be surrounded by dead loved ones as the move for maximum comfort when approaching death. Interesting, right? You might want to try 5MEO DMT sometime.

You'll have some really interesting shit happening to brain regarding death. I have my own experience to add to that. The dumping of adrenaline and dopamine made my almost death pain free. I did not know about my injuries until later and I was surprisingly okay with buying the pharma 27. Okay, yeah, you've already experienced those chemicals.

But on a larger scale, those hormones or hormones did exactly what they were supposed to do. Also interesting that as humans evolved, we created language and almost immediately created a God or God-like figure to make sense of our reality. How come? Have humans like the Jim Jones of history use the idea of God to manipulate, subjugate, murder, and commit the worst atrocity against others for control?

Yes. It is a powerful idea. and we know how humans behave where power is concerned, it corrupts absolutely. I would posit that there is a reason it is such a powerful idea based on neurobiology and physiology. It supersedes consciousness. Human brains are wired for community, cooperation, and fare much better in groups than solo. The practice of meeting with your neighbors for whatever reason has always been pleasing to us. Is the human brain the real God? I love this email.

I've often wondered about how even if you say our brains create a God and kept him around for thousands of years, the idea of peace after death, community, prayer has all shown itself to be extremely beneficial to the human species. Neurological pathways that light up during prayer are the same that are activated during meditation. There is healing happening when those pathways are activated. Studies with

placebos are as controls, report that some individuals who are not given actual medicine still improve seemingly because they believed they would get better. Brains have convinced their bodies into believing they are pregnant, so much so, they begin to show symptoms of pregnancy. That's fucking crazy. Leading me to

Haley Zegas brain, possibly using the image of a child to help her through that experience and keep her alive, which is still crazy to think about. But truly, our brains are so ridiculous it wouldn't surprise me. I'm not a doctor or neurologist, but I work as a biologist in the field, and I'm never not in complete awe of how our brains have evolved. The human species is pretty goddamn weird and singular as a whole. Deep breathing and introspection relating our position in the universe. The fact we can even think about position in the universe, about our position in the universe, and type it into cyberspace and send it to another meat sack is absolutely nuts to me. What a wild and crazy fun species we are.

All to say that our brains have been working hard to rationalize our surroundings from the very beginning and we still have many of the same questions. Pivot again to the third man syndrome. There is a phenomenon known as the third person effect where a person in a dangerous situation like being lost in the woods or stranded outside of civilization has experienced a mysterious third person who ultimately keeps the individual alive until they can get help. I've attached some resources to help explain it.

Is it supernatural? God, angels, or is it all natural? Just our brains doing what they can. Either way, I'm in awe. Keep it curious, you wonderful bastard. Keep doing what you do, Leah. Ah, man, thank you, Leah. That is so much to think about.

Our brains are so fucking wild. And someday, for too long, but I have more time, and I'm not doing so much content. each week, I want to explore these kind of questions just for my own, you know, personal reasons. And dig in further. There's so much interesting literature and studies about the consciousness and this kind of stuff. And mystical feelings versus, you know, possible mystical realities. Oh, man, I think, you know, like questions like, you know, do our brains produce these kind of, you know, mystical symptoms, if you will, or experiences?

which means that there is no real kind of, you know, creator and stuff out there, or did a creator imbue our brains with the ability to have these experiences? Is there some, you know, truly mystical foundation for this? Something magical. It is magical. I think we are magical creatures one way or another. I mean, I could get so weird with all this.

Even like working on fictional stories, it's hard to explain. But there is this sense that if you just open yourself up and allow the story to come to you and come through you and not dictate it, it will be better than if you try and force it. That's always been true for me with like creative stuff and it's a weird fucking feeling

and it makes me, it does feel like you're tapping into something else as opposed to forcing something out of your own brain. I don't know, it's all so strange. But to think about ghosts and spirits possibly

being just manifestations of our own mind and what is possible. I mean, yeah, and we've been thinking about these things for thousands of years. Religion, spiritual, you know, systems all developed out of the same questions we continue to ask one another.

And maybe one day we'll have answers. And if not, we'll create a lot of cool stories in the meantime, trying to figure out out. Thanks for the messages, everybody, so much to think about, as usual. Time suckers, I needed that. We all did. Well, thank you for listening to another bad magic productions podcast. Be sure in rate and review time suck if you haven't already.

Please don't take your mommy or daddy issues out on the rest of the world, right, this week, or ever. Get help. move with the therapist. You don't have to keep living in a terrible cycle from your past. There's more to life than that. Pause.

Take a deep breath. Reflect. Use your fucking mystical, magical mind to calm down and keep on sucking. I always think it's interesting to hear from these dirtbags when possible. So now just a bit more about Charles.

After he was freed in 2022, he's gotten out so many fucking times. He was interviewed from several places. One of them, a British television television, special called Real Serpent that aired on Channel 4 in the UK. Let's hear a few minutes of forensic psychologist Paul Britton interviewing than assessing him here. And note, while in the past, he has admitted

to various murders, mostly to authors, currently he's denying all his past admissions and saying he didn't kill anybody. So that's the confusion there. And here he is. Paul Britain is a leading forensic psychologist. He has decades of experience interviewing serial killers and assisting the police in high-profile murder investigations, such as that of Fred and Rose West. The plan is for him to join the investigation to produce a psychological profile of Subrarch and determine if he's a dangerous psychopath. Psychologist Paul Britton is keen to further explore the importance of drugs in the execution of Subraj's crimes. How would you select? How would you decide who you would sleep in that way?

Mostly, I will have taken what I call those victims, but which I call, let's say, clients, to make it simple, right? In discussion. May I stop you from, and thank you, because it's not an easy thing to do. You have used the term quite correctly of victims, and yes, you've mentioned clients, but the measurement of dosage is quite a difficult discipline. and it's so easy to get it wrong. And that is something that must have happened with you from time to time.

How do you deal with that? Nobody has died from drugs, from my drugs. But it's quite a difficult enterprise to put yourself in... Well, what I did, I read some pharmaceutical books, and then also I tried those drugs. Not on me. On whom? Some of the hippies that I ask, okay, because they are taking drugs.

I will then ask them, for example, okay, when you take such, they do the dosage, okay, take it. And you tell me, then I will look at my watch. So you use them as guinea pigs? Yeah, exactly. Okay. We'll leave that there then for the moment. Oh, okay, you for the shit. Thank you very much indeed.

Please. Even though it was nearly 80, do you think there is. There are signs they that suggest he's still a dangerous man. This is a man who still believes that unless the world, those around him, can provide what he believes is his right, he will find a way to take it. That's what I would expect. So dangerous? I would not want to say he's not dangerous.

Is this too going to kill somebody again? you're never too old to poison.