PIERRE CHANAL

Pierre Chanal (Saint-Etienne, Loire, 18 November 1946 – Reims, 15 October 2003)

Was a French soldier and suspected serial killer. He was convicted of the rape and kidnapping of a young Hungarian man (Falvay, Balázs) whom he picked up hitch-hiking in 1988. He received a 10-year sentence for the attack, and was released in 1995 on probation. He was accused of murdering three of eight young men who disappeared in northeastern France between 1980 and 1987.One of his alleged victims was Irishman Trevor O'Keeffe.Chanal committed suicide in prison in 2003 while on trial.

A French commando-trained army veteran and fitness fanatic suspected of being a sadistic serial killer may never face trial because interminable delays in the case. Investigators believe that 52-year-old Pierre Chanal -- described by comrades as "an archetypal warrior and man of steel" -- murdered eight young men in the 1980s. The eight victims vanished in or near an area in the Marne region, north-east of Paris, known as the "triangle of death". Seven of the bodies have never been found. Most of the men were army conscripts from the Mourmelon camp where Chanal served. Taciturn military authorities assumed the men were deserters and dismissed any talks of a serial killer in their ranks.

Chanal became a career soldier as soon as he was old enough to enlist, escaping from a desperately poor family of 16 children and a violent, alcoholic father. A born leader, he rose steadily through the ranks to become the senior warrant officer in the illustrious 4th Dragoons regiment, where his toughness and dedication to duty earned him high praise. A typical man's man, Chanal volunteered for service with the French military contingent deployed in Beirut at the height of Lebanon's bloody civil war.

Discribed as a "block of marble" by an investigating officer, Chanal's weakness fro raping and torturing young men was uncovered in 1988 when a police patrol -- investigating the sight of a Volkswagen camper van on an isolated country road -- found him assaulting the terrified Hungarian hitchhikker he picked up near the Mourmelon camp who he had trussed up in a parachute harness while a video camera recorded the assault.

In true military fashion Chanal provided only his name, rank and service number to the arresting officers. In his cell, he would rise at dawn every morning for a frenetic bout of exercises, then spend hours in silence, staring intently at the walls. "He acted like he was a prisoner of war," said one police officer. The murder investigation began when a pair of men's underpants labelled "Made in Britain" were discovered in Chanal's van. Police believed that they had belonged to Trevor O'Keefe, a 20-year-old Irishman who vanished two years earlier during a walking tour that took him through the Marne region. His naked body was eventually found dumped in a wood. He had been savagely beaten, then strangled with a cord knotted in a fashion taught in the French commando forces.

Police discovered that Chanal had purchased his video camera only a few days before the first of the disappearances happened eight years earlier. Police also established that nobody had been reported missing in the region while Chanal was in Lebanon. The attack on the Hungarian - which investigators said they feared would have ended in murder had the assault not been interrupted - took place after Chanal had been transferred to a new post but while he was still returning frequently to the area to jump with a local parachute club.

He was formally placed under investigation in connection with the disappearances while he was in prison for raping and torturing the hitchhikker. With time off for good behaviour Chanal was due for release in 1994, but was kept in detention after the O'Keefe case was added to his dossier. He was released from jail in June 1995, to live at a sister's home near Lyons under strict judicial control.

A year later, fresh forensic-science tests on the camper van discovered traces of human hairs, and subsequent DNA analysis indicated the strong probability that they came from the last two of the conscripts to disappear. By then, investigators had turned to psychiatrists to find cracks in Chanal's steely resolve. With the help of the FBI's behavioural science unit, they arrived at the conclusion that they were dealing with a truly chilling personality. The reports described Chanal as "both obsessive and sadistic - characterised by aberrant sexual conduct which leads him to seek pleasure by inflicting humiliation and suffering on others". Nevertheless, with scant genetic evidence and a psychological profile police will be hard-pressed to make a case against this warring serial killer.

A French commando-trained army veteran and fitness fanatic suspected of being a sadistic serial killer may never face trial because interminable delays in the case. Investigators believe that 52-year-old Pierre Chanal -- described by comrades as "an archetypal warrior and man of steel" -- murdered eight young men in the 1980s. The eight victims vanished in or near an area in the Marne region, north-east of Paris, known as the "triangle of death". Seven of the bodies have never been found. Most of the men were army conscripts from the Mourmelon camp where Chanal served. Taciturn military authorities assumed the men were deserters and dismissed any talks of a serial killer in their ranks.

Chanal became a career soldier as soon as he was old enough to enlist, escaping from a desperately poor family of 16 children and a violent, alcoholic father. A born leader, he rose steadily through the ranks to become the senior warrant officer in the illustrious 4th Dragoons regiment, where his toughness and dedication to duty earned him high praise. A typical man's man, Chanal volunteered for service with the French military contingent deployed in Beirut at the height of Lebanon's bloody civil war.

Discribed as a "block of marble" by an investigating officer, Chanal's weakness fro raping and torturing young men was uncovered in 1988 when a police patrol -- investigating the sight of a Volkswagen camper van on an isolated country road -- found him assaulting the terrified Hungarian hitchhikker he picked up near the Mourmelon camp who he had trussed up in a parachute harness while a video camera recorded the assault.

In true military fashion Chanal provided only his name, rank and service number to the arresting officers. In his cell, he would rise at dawn every morning for a frenetic bout of exercises, then spend hours in silence, staring intently at the walls. "He acted like he was a prisoner of war," said one police officer. The murder investigation began when a pair of men's underpants labelled "Made in Britain" were discovered in Chanal's van. Police believed that they had belonged to Trevor O'Keefe, a 20-year-old Irishman who vanished two years earlier during a walking tour that took him through the Marne region. His naked body was eventually found dumped in a wood. He had been savagely beaten, then strangled with a cord knotted in a fashion taught in the French commando forces.

Police discovered that Chanal had purchased his video camera only a few days before the first of the disappearances happened eight years earlier. Police also established that nobody had been reported missing in the region while Chanal was in Lebanon. The attack on the Hungarian - which investigators said they feared would have ended in murder had the assault not been interrupted - took place after Chanal had been transferred to a new post but while he was still returning frequently to the area to jump with a local parachute club.

He was formally placed under investigation in connection with the disappearances while he was in prison for raping and torturing the hitchhikker. With time off for good behaviour Chanal was due for release in 1994, but was kept in detention after the O'Keefe case was added to his dossier. He was released from jail in June 1995, to live at a sister's home near Lyons under strict judicial control.

A year later, fresh forensic-science tests on the camper van discovered traces of human hairs, and subsequent DNA analysis indicated the strong probability that they came from the last two of the conscripts to disappear. By then, investigators had turned to psychiatrists to find cracks in Chanal's steely resolve. With the help of the FBI's behavioural science unit, they arrived at the conclusion that they were dealing with a truly chilling personality. The reports described Chanal as "both obsessive and sadistic - characterised by aberrant sexual conduct which leads him to seek pleasure by inflicting humiliation and suffering on others". Nevertheless, with scant genetic evidence and a psychological profile police will be hard-pressed to make a case against this warring serial killer.