While the murder weapon has been found, the course of the fatal fire on rue de Charonne, in Paris, is becoming clearer. Suspicion falls on the tenant of the apartment where the flames started, who died while trying to escape the fire through the facade of the building.
A double murder. The fire to erase the traces. Then, the fatal fall of the attacker trying to flee the flames. According to information from Le Parisien, this would be the scenario favored by investigators from the Paris judicial police to explain the fire that occurred on Sunday April 7, on the 7th floor of 146 rue de Charonne, in the 11th arrondissement of Paris. Three people were found dead after the fire. If it is still too early to draw conclusions, the clues, entrusted to the scientific police, could confirm the thesis.
One of the bodies was identified as that of the tenant of the accommodation from which the flames started. He apparently threw himself out of the window while trying to escape the fire via the facade of the building. In his studio, two other bodies, bearing bullet wounds, were found charred. On the ground, fabrics and newspapers had probably been soaked in gasoline. Broken glass from a hookah littered the floor.
The main hypothesis therefore supposes that the first would be the author of the shooting murder of his two guests. Then, to remove the traces of his crime, he allegedly set fire to the crime scene by spraying his home with hydrocarbons. The alleged murderer, however, would have underestimated the consequences of rapid combustion and would have unwittingly made himself responsible for the explosion.
Another new element of the case revealed this Friday April 12 by Le Parisien: the murder weapon was found. “It was discovered on Monday afternoon by the police in a trash can in the basement of the building, specifies a resident. […] Apparently, in addition to a golden colt, there was ammunition and clothes with traces of blood,” a tenant of the building told the newspaper.
This latest discovery could well incriminate the 38-year-old tenant. An Afghan refugee, he is described as “discreet, polite, without fuss” by his neighbors. “He had lived there for about two years,” a resident of the building told Le Parisien, who suggested that he must have been a worker “based on his work clothes”. On him, the police found “several different identity documents”, says BFMTV and four mobile phones, specifies Le Parisien questioning the nature of his professional activity.
One of the victims was also an Afghan refugee. Identified by his best friend, Rashid lived in the Paris suburbs. He “worked in construction. He trained as a plumber. He had set up a small courier company, but he mainly went to construction sites”, says the victim’s relative, assuring that he does not know his friend’s alleged murderer. “If it happened between Afghans, there is a chance that we will one day know the truth,” he confided to the still bereaved Parisian. As of Friday, April 12, the third body has still not been identified.