French Slaying Suspect Dead

[Conley]

A 23-year-old Frenchman who claimed responsibility for killing four men and three children died on Thursday after jumping from a window, still firing from a weapon in his hand, as security forces stormed the apartment where he had been holed up for more than 30 hours, Claude Guéant, the French interior minister, said.

Just before noon, officers entered the apartment through a front door and windows that had been blasted out, Mr. Guéant said. Inside the apartment, the suspect, identified as Mohammed Merah, emerged from a bathroom “firing with extreme violence,” Mr. Guéant said.

“At the end, Mohammed Merah jumped out a window with a weapon in his hand, still firing,” he said. “He was found dead on the ground.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/23/world/europe/mohammed-merah-toulouse-shooting-suspect-french-police-standoff.html?_r=1&hp

Merah, 23, who claimed to have al-Qaeda training, was suspected of killing four people at a Jewish school and three soldiers in three separate attacks.

He had said he was acting to "avenge Palestinian children" and protest against French military interventions overseas.

It had been unclear how the gunman died, but prosecutor Francois Molins confirmed in a news conference that he had been killed by a shot to the head by a police marksman as he tried to flee.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17473207

[Mister D]

I started a thread on this too but Peter had updated the original thread about this so I merged the two.

[Conley]

I saw that - I couldn't tell what happened. I didn't even know we had had that power. :laugh:

I think it's a big enough story to have more than one thread on it. I like to skim our headlines like newspapers. Do the newspapers keep updating their articles? Sometimes, but when there are breaks in the case they come out with new stories. Just my sense of it, if others disagree I won't do it.

[Mister D]

:laugh: It doesn't matter. No one had commented on my thread yet exceopt for Peter letting me know so I moved it.

[Conley]

:laugh: It doesn't matter. No one had commented on my thread yet exceopt for Peter letting me know so I moved it.

Thanks for understanding moDerator. :wink: I give Peter credit for breaking the story first out of all of us.

[Mister D]

Thanks for understanding moDerator. :wink: I give Peter credit for breaking the story first out of all of us.

Harummph...technically, my new thread has the earlier time stamp.

[Conley]

Oh really? Then you should have deleted his post and banned him if he protested. :grin:

[Peter1469]

D is a gentleman. He would do no such thing.

[Conley]

So I saw this suspect had a criminal record, but nothing related to terrorism. He claims to have trained with AQ but I didn't see anything about him breaking out of an Afghan prison. I think that may have just been rumor.

[Conley]

D is a gentleman. He would do no such thing.

:roflmao: A gentleman and ​a scholar.

[Mister D]

It's all so true. :grin:

[Conley]

Have the police recovered the videos that were supposedly recorded of the murders? I hope they don't get out in public.

[Mister D]

Wasn't this guy recording online rants?

[Conley]

I saw that he planned on uploading the videos but thankfully I don't think he got around to doing it. Looks like the motorcycle was the break in the case:

The authorities said they initially suspected both Mr. Merah and his brother Abdelkader, 29, who was known locally for his radical religious ideology and had been detained for questioning outside Toulouse on Monday.

Explosives were found in Abdelkader’s car on Wednesday, the police said, and Mr. Merah was tracked in part because his mother’s computer had been used to make contact with his first victim, a French soldier selling a motorbike online, whom Mr. Merah says he killed on March 11.

[Mister D]

Ah, I see. MMC mentioned the bike link earlier. So this guy made contact with one of the victims prior to the shooting?

[Peter1469]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2118052/Toulouse-shooting-First-picture-Al-Qaeda-fanatic-Mohammed-Merah-suspected-killing-7.html

This article mentions the Afghan connection.

It also has a picture of his brother being arrested. They put a towel on his head.... :shocked:

Priceless.

[Mister D]

:laugh:

They keep calling this guy a serial killer. I wonder if that came from the top so as to not foment ethnic tension.

[Conley]

Ah, I see. MMC mentioned the bike link earlier. So this guy made contact with one of the victims prior to the shooting?

Yes, it looks like that was how they started to track him down.

[Conley]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2118052/Toulouse-shooting-First-picture-Al-Qaeda-fanatic-Mohammed-Merah-suspected-killing-7.html

This article mentions the Afghan connection.

It also has a picture of his brother being arrested. They put a towel on his head.... :shocked:

Priceless.

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/03/21/article-2118052-12450530000005DC-161_306x423.jpg

[Mister D]

Yes, it looks like that was how they started to track him down.

Not the brightest lad.

[Peter1469]

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2012/03/21/article-2118052-12450530000005DC-161_306x423.jpgt

Now that is a towel head....

[Conley]

Not the brightest lad.

So if I'm a cop, I look at the dead guy's emails and see he was approached by a stranger named Mohammed. That's probably one of the first doors I'd knock on, especially when terrorism was suspected all along. It's wrong to say but that's what I would think, and maybe that Jewish family would still be alive. I shouldn't even second guess but since this is anonymous, I'm free to talk out of my ass.

[Mister D]

So if I'm a cop, I look at the dead guy's emails and see he was approached by a stranger named Mohammed. That's probably one of the first doors I'd knock on, especially when terrorism was suspected all along. It's wrong to say but that's what I would think, and maybe that Jewish family would still be alive. I shouldn't even second guess but since this is anonymous, I'm free to talk out of my ass.

Meanwhile the Mayor of Toulouse along with other nimrods bloviates about neo-Nazis.