Morges train station
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – A 65-year-old man who lives in the Lake Geneva Riviera area made racial remarks to a group of youths Friday 23 March in the 22:30 Geneva to Brig train, shortly before Morges and was attacked by some of them.
He was punched and suffered knife wounds to the throat and chest, near the heart, but his life is not in danger, say Vaud Police.
Two young men were arrested, ages 20 and 17, one of them Swiss and the other Bolivian. Both live in Geneva and the second has a B permit.
Police are seeking witnesses who can provide any information related to the incident. The man came out of the toilets on the train at 22:50 and made what police describe as “xenophobic” remarks to the group. He was punched in the face and knifed during the fight that broke out.
He phoned police while chasing his attackers, and all of them got off the train in Morges, which remained in the station as police arrived. Other members of the group were questioned on the train by police but the two suspected of the attack were caught by police about 100 metres from the Morges train station.
Anyone with information is asked to go to the nearest police station or phone +41 21 644 4444.
Bastien Monnet, body found in woods near Martigny
SION, SWITZERLAND – Police in canton Valais say the body of 20-year-old Bastien Monnet, who has been missing from Martigny since 29 January 2012, was found in woods in Vérossaz 17 March by a farmer.
No further details were provided.
A second death was reported Tuesday morning 20 March in St Luc, in the Val d’Anniviers.
A passerby reported seeing the wreckage from a car crash on the route du Prilet, a road down to Vissoie, shortly after 09:00.
Police arriving on the scene found a 27-year-old Frenchman who was injured but who had managed to get out of the car on his own.
St Luc crash took one life, left a 27-yr-old man injured
They also found the body of a 33-year-old French woman.
The circumstances surrounding the accident are not yet clear, according to police.
Blocher, strategist for right-wing People’s Party, ironically under suspicion for breaking bank secrecy laws
Blocher, during a TV appearance in 2010
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – The search Tuesday 20 March by Zurich police of both the home and the office of Christophe Blocher startled the Swiss political world, in part because Blocher has been a staunch supporter of Swiss bank secrecy.
The searches were ordered by Zurich’s public prosecutor, after an official inquiry was opened, making it official that Blocher is under suspicion for breaking bank secrecy laws at the end of 2011.
He was part of a chain of at three people who saw private bank information for an account belonging to the Swiss National Bank (SNB) chairman and it was Blocher who contacted the Swiss president to suggest that the head of the Swiss central bank may have illegally profited from a personal currency transaction.
Blocher was on the receiving end of copies of private bank account information for Philipp Hildebrand, then head of the Swiss National Bank, in December. The two had clashed, and Blocher made no secret of his desire to see Hildebrand go.
An employee at the bank where Hildebrand and his wife had a personal account became suspicious about the sale of a large amount of currency. He took the information to a lawyer and politician, who contacted Blocher. The information was shared with then-President Micheline Calmy-Rey and it was leaked to the press.
The end result was that Hildebrand resigned in early January, the central bank hired an outside firm to investigate and Hildebrand was subsequently cleared of any wrongdoing, but the incident resulted in the SNB tightening its rules for board members’ own transactions, for greater transparency.
Timing, of the essence, for opening the investigation and for the search
La Liberté in Fribourg quotes a former police officer and vice’president of the UDC, Yves Perrin, as saying the searches were inevitable. “I’m surprised, though, that they weren’t carried out earalier because, with the passage of time, proof becomes harder to find. If I were in possession of compromising documents or materials, I would have lit a fire in the fireplace long ago.” That said, he adds, not finding proof is not proof of innocence, either.
Timing in the affair has been and remains a critical issue, reports the Tribune de Geneve: Blocher’s lawyer is reported as saying his client is invoking parliamentary immunity, which means that the materials seized, reportedly including Blocher’s cell phone and computer, are under lock and key while a parliamentary commission decides if the charges against him are linked to his role in parliament.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The victims caught by an avalanche in northern Norway were from the Geneva area, two of them doctors and two of them bankers at the Geneva offices of Lombard Odier Darier Hentsch. All were very experienced ski tourers, and their two French guides were very experienced, but Swiss media are reporting that the accident has provoked heated debate in Norway. The group that was hit was the more experienced of the 12 who went out together. One of the doctors is described by RTS as a “very seasoned mountaineer” but his wife, with less experience, was not hit by the snow slide.
The avalanche risk was 3 out of 5, with warmer weather starting, and the slope where the avalanche occurred was reportedly 42 degrees, with locals quoted as saying they would never go there in this weather and that under such conditions any slope steeper than 30 degrees is too dangerous.
The four clients who died were all Swiss, and the guide who died was with the mobile emergency and reanimation unit (SMUR) in Annecy. The other guide, who was not caught by the avalanche, is a senior member of France’s high mountain rescue unit in Annecy, the Peloton de gendarmerie de haute montagne (PGHM), according to RTS, public broadcasting.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The cause of the bus crash that killed 28 people 13 March in Sierre, and injured 24 others, was most likely human error or a technical problem, the public prosecutor in charge of the case insists, despite media stories making the rounds that the driver may have been inserting a DVD or have been distracted by a teacher who brought the DVD to the front of the bus, information the chief investigator denies.
Two parents of children who were injured have reportedly told media that the children say a one of the teachers had gone to the front of the bus to hand the DVD to the driver.
A team of investigators that includes a specialist in interviewing children in police cases will be traveling from Switzerland to Belgium next week to interview the children as part of the effort to understand what went wrong.
Olivier Elsig, who is heading the investigation, says that while recovering children have said they saw the menu for a movie come up on the screen shortly before the crash, there is no evidence nor does he have any reports that someone had moved to the front of the bus. Film footage from the tunnel shortly before the crash shows all the adults seated at the front of the bus.
The cause of the crash remains unclear, but Elsig Friday 16 March issued a statement making a number of points:
Technical investigations
- Investigators are completing the mapping of the scene and analyzing recovered traces of the accident
- Video footage have made it possible to follow the path of the bus: they exclude an initial crash on the left side of the tunnel as well as the involvement of another vehicle
- Several documents about the buses and their drivers have been received in Valais and are being reviewed
- Tachygraph disk scanning will allow investigators to determine the precise speed of the bus; the first images appear to show the bus going under the speed limit, which is 100kph in the tunnel
- The technical check of the bus is underway; experts are being selected who will ultimately determine if the vehicle had any defects.
Interviews
- People who were driving near the bus before the accident, and who contacted police, are still being interviewed
- A dozen of the children who were injured have been interviewed and no information has turned up that would make it possible to determine the causes(s) of the accident: this includes the theory of a moment of inattention while linked to a DVD being inserted – none of the witnesses saw the driver making such moves.
The autopsy
Partial autopsy results (further analyses are being done) show that:
- it appears the driver died from trauma injuries
- no presence of alcohol was found in his system
- no pre-existing pathology or other element has turned up to encourage the idea he may have had a sudden health problem.
Causes of the accident
Two theories remain:
- a technical cause linked to a vehicle defect
- human cause as a result of error or a moment’s inattention.
Accident just 24km from Sion, where injured children, families were being prepared to fly to Belgium
Deadly accident on the A9 near Fully Friday noon
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – It has been a particularly deadly week on Swiss roads, and canton Valais, still reeling from the Sierre autoroute tunnel crash Tuesday that killed 28 people, had a second fatal accident on the A9 Friday, bringing to 31 the number of people who have died on Vaud and Valais roads in less than four days.
Traffic on the A9 from Martigny to Sion was stopped and emergency traffic signs were in place after a vehicle caught fire in the emergency lane of the autoroute Friday 16 March at 11:45, near the Fully-Saxon area. For reasons that are not yet clear, a van crashed into the back of a stationary truck, catching fire. Other drivers rushed to put out the fire and to free the trapped driver, unsuccessfully.
Police have not yet identified the victim.
Fully is just 24km from Sion, where police and hospital workers were busy loading children from Tuesday’s bus crash into air ambulances to fly back to Belgium and their initial route takes them directly over the autoroute where the crash occurred.
The road was closed between Martigny and Sion from 11:35 to 16:10 and from Sion to Martigny from 11:35 to 14:40.
Three children from the bus crash remain in critical condition at the Chuv university hospitals in Lausanne and a motorcyclist hit by a car Thursday in Tolochenaz near Morges is also hospitalized at the Chuv, in critical condition.
A motorcyclist and his passenger died when they collided with a car in Genolier, Vaud Thursday.
Swiss government to review safety of tunnel pullover emergency areas
Holy Cross Church in Sierre was filled to overflowing as the town's citizens came for special mass Thursday night, for those who died or who have been hurt
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Eight of the children injured in the 13 March bus crash in Sierre, canton Valais, that killed 28 people are heading home in specially-equipped planes, police said in a statement issued Thursday evening.
They were discreetly taken to say goodbye to their friends who remain hospitalized in Sion until they are able to travel. Three Belgian armed forces planes were given a special dispensation to land at the airport in Sion in order to pick up the children and their families.
Dr Jean-Pierre Desfarzes, who has headed the emergency medical team dealing with the accident, says that the next 48 hours will be crucial for the most seriously injured, who may suffer long-term neurological and “functional” damage due to the severity of their injuries.
Four of the eight who are heading home have been in the hospital in Visp and four in Sion. Another 10 remain in the Sion hospital, but all have now been moved out of intensive care. The three in Lausanne at the Chuv remain in critical condition and one child flown to Bern suffered multiple fractures and a severe concussion.
“In the hours following the accident we were pessimistic,” Desfarzes told GenevaLunch, “but quite a few are recovering well.”
Dr Desfarzes says that despite the small size of the towns in the area, “Valais has an amazing capacity to absorb” a large number of injured people. The Valais Hospital trauma centre status means that 16 medical disciplines must be on call 24 hours a day. During the night of Tuesday to Wednesday some 150 medical workers were part of the emergency trauma team. Valais Hospital is a collection of nine medical treatment sites throughout the canton.
Fifty operations were carried out on 16 patients, mainly in Sion, which has served as the planning and main treatment centre this week.
Valais Police Chief Christophe Varone briefs the media at the site of the crash Thursday, after the families visited it
The staff included dozens of nurses and operating room assistants, radiology technicians, 10 surgeons and 10 emergency medicine doctors, anesthetists, intensive care specialist physicians, radiologists, pediatricians and pediatric surgeons.
The small city of Sion was able to handle such a heavy burden because of good coordination, say police: Visp, Martigny and Sierre hospitals were able to promptly take in those with lesser injuries and provide them with a very high level of care.
Desfarzes told GenevaLunch that he was proud of the team’s preparedness, which involved quickly bringing together a large number of people who were off-duty or on vacation.
Valais police and the hospitals will not be allowing interviews with any of the children or their families in order to protect their privacy, they told media.
Thursday, late afternoon, more than 250 journalists were taken to visit the site of the crash, the cause of which remains unclear for now. The federal highway department told news agency ats earlier in the day that it is reviewing the “angled” (with corners) emergency areas that are the norm throughout Switzerland.
Media from around the world have streamed into Sierre; today they were taken by police to visit the tunnel crash site before it re-opens
Head-on crash into tunnel wall killed 28, injured 24 in Sierre, Switzerland (photo, Valais police)
SIERRE / GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Police in Valais are trying to piece together the cause of the Tuesday night 13 March accident they are describing as “of an extreme violence”.
Twenty-eight people, 22 of whom were children about age 12, lost their lives in the crash at 21:15 Tuesday night.
Valais police chief Christian Varone immediately informed Belgium’s ambassador to Switzerland, Jan Luykx, who went directly to the scene of the crash to help police contact the families as quickly as possible.
In a Wednesday morning bulletin police provide slightly more detail but the cause of the crash and the high number of deaths and injuries remains baffling for now: the bus veered to the right in the tunnel and into the wall at the end of an emergency pullover area.
The impact was so violent that the front of the bus trapped a number of passengers, who had to be cut out by firefighters. Rescuers have made reference to the high speed at which the bus must have been travelling for the crash to have such an impact, but it is not yet clear if the bus, one of three in a group carrying the Belgian students and adults, was traveling within the speed limit, which is 100kph inside the tunnel.
The accident, which sent 24 people, mainly children, to six hospitals, including the Chuv university hospitals in Lausanne and the cantonal hospital in Bern, called on a large number of emergency services: 30 police officers, 60 firefighters from Sierre and Sion, 15 doctors, 100 members of cleanup crews, 12 ambulances, 8 emergency helicopters (Air Glaciers, Air Zermatt, Rega), 3 psychologists who are providing counseling.
Ed. note: RTS, Swiss public radio/television in French, is providing regular updates that include photos of the very badly damaged front of the bus, taken in Sierre Wednesday morning.
Bus carried two classes of 12-year-olds; 24 injured
The bus carried 58 people, with the children from two towns in Flanders, Lommel and Heverlee. It was heading home at the end of the trip.Switzerland's Val d'Anniviers, where the school group had been skiing
Update 07:10 GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – A bus from Belgium, carrying two school classes of children who had just finished a week of ski holidays in the Val d’Anniviers, crashed in an autoroute tunnel in Sierre late Tuesday 13 March, killing 28 people and leaving 24 injured, Valais police say.
The accident occurred at 21.15 Tuesday night. The bus had just entered the autoroute and was in the tunnel that links the west and east A9 autoroute exits for Sierre when it swerved and crashed head-on into the tunnel wall at the end of an emergency pullover area.
The tunnel was built only 10 years ago, is wide and well-lit, relatively flat, with gradual curves, and the weather was dry and clear Tuesday evening so the tunnel and tires would have been dry.
The two bus drivers died in the accident. Police investigators are trying to determine what caused the accident.
Those who were injured are being treated in four area hospitals, with some flown to the Chuv in Lausanne and one to Bern.
The families, accompanied by psychologists, will be arriving in Switzerland during the day Wednesday.
Valais police have set up a hotline
From outside Switzerland +41 848 112 117
From Switzerland 0848 112 117
Update, Valais police report in Dutch
Sierre : een ernstig ongeluk met een Bus uit belgie
De 13.03.2012rond 21,15 In de Tunnel van de autobaan in Sierre is een ernstig ongeval gebeurd .
Een bus met belgische nummerplaat is tegen de wand van de tunnel opgeklapt.
Verscheidene personen zijn ernstig verwond, Een grootscheepse hulp actie is opgezet.
De bus reed vanaf Sierre richting sion. Terwijl hij in de tunnel reed ,is de bus van de weg afgeraakt en is tegen de wand aangereden op het einde van een vluchtplaats.
Verscheidene personen zijn ernstig verwond. De hulpgroepen zijn nog altijd bezig.De gewonden zijn vervoerd naar verscheidene ziekenhuizen,
De politie heeft een hulplijn opgezet die uitsluitend voor de families zijn gereserveerd.
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – A man was killed with a knife during a fight at the Staefa station in Zurich shortly after 18:00, city police say. Bypassers and rescue workers provided immediate help but failed to save the man. Another man is under arrest, but police are not providing further details.
One Audi that didn't make it to the end of the rally: now in police hands
SION, SWITZERLAND – A 23-year-old British driver was caught by police 3 March at 16:40 doing 182kph in an 80 zone between Martigny and Verbier.
He was taking part in a London-Verbier rally announced on the Internet but was the only driver caught going over the limit by police checks. His car, an Audi R8 was clocked at 180 at “Les Trappistes”, between Bovernier and Sembrancher, and police confiscated the vehicle.
Swiss police have been keeping a close eye on such rallies since they caught some 20 motorcyclists in 2007 who were crossing Switzerland at speeds well above the limit.
The cars that took part in the London-Verbier rally were Ferraris, Mercedes and Audis, and they reached canton Valais via the A9 autoroute.
Small plane crash: police say not yet clear if it was landing or taking off when the crash occurred
Update 4 March SION / LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – The two occupants of a small plane that crashed Saturday morning 3 March on the Diablerets glacier/Tsanfleuron had to be cut out of the plane by the Sion fire department before they could be flown to the hospital in Sion.
Valais police said Sunday the pilot was a 58-year-old Neuchatel man and a 49-year-old Vaud woman, who live in canton Valais. She sustained light injuries and was able to leave the hospital. He remains in hospital with multiple fractures.
An alarm was raised by another pilot in the area at 10:50; the plane had taken off earlier from Bex, but the identity of the man and woman is not yet known, nor is the cause of the accident.
The crash occurred on the Saviese commune part of the glacier.
Les Diablerets plane crash on the glacier
Three Air Glacier helicopters and the Sion fire department were called to the rescue
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – A car that attracted the attention of police in Founex, canton Vaud, at 10:40 Saturday morning 3 March turned out to have stolen plates and when police took up positions to try to stop the car it took off rapidly. The car led police on a high-speed chase through Commugny, Founex, Chavannes-de-Bogis and Bogis-Bossey, driving on the wrong side of the road at times and crashing into two police vehicles, one belonging to customs police and the other to the cantonal gendarmerie.
When the vehicles was stopped the three occupants fled on foot. Two were captured and one remains at large. The two Frenchmen who were arrested are ages 27 and 28.
Customs police in Geneva activated the French-Swiss customs police cooperation centre (Centre de coopération police douane, CCPD), which coordinated the work of 23 patrols called into action, from Bursins, the Vaud gendarmerie dog unit, Nyon communal police, customs police, canton Geneva police and the French gendarmerie.
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – The search for victims of an avalanche at Les Diablerets in canton Vaud has been called off, after 150 rescue workers combed the area and ran tests for evidence of victims Wednesday evening 29 February that showed no evidence anyone was caught by it. A team is back on the slopes Thursday morning to recover gear and check further, but canton Vaud police say there have been no reports of missing persons since their alert yesterday.
Update 2, 22:05 LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – The search was halted at 20:30 Wednesday night 29 February for victims of an avalanche at Les Diablerets in canton Vaud, with no electronic or other evidence found that anyone had been caught by it. A group of 50 rescue workers, dogs, police, Diablerets ski school instructors, local volunteers and Rega helicopters spent the afternoon and evening searching for victims of the avalanche, triggered at 14:00 Wednesday afternoon, 29 February. It measured 200m long and 60m wide.
Police say it began at la Tête de Meilleret and moved slowly down towards the Col de la Croix. They labelled it a slow-moving mass, an avalanche de fond, where the snow mass separates right down to the level of the soil.
One witness told police two people may have been caught skiing off piste but another witness contacted police to say he was near the Col de la Croix and he was able to view the avalanche from its start, but did not see any skiers in the area.
Police are asking anyone who was skiing in the area Wednesday afternoon, who might have information that would help them determine if anyone is missing, to contact police at +41 21 644 4444, or to contact the nearest police station.
Lucie was murdered near Zurich in March 2008
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The 28-year-old man accused of killing 16-year-old Lucie Trezzini from Fribourg in March 2009 was sentenced to 20 years in prison Wednesday.
The defense for Daniel, who has a long history of drug and alcohol abuse, Wednesday morning asked for the sentence to be limited to 18 years, with a series of long and intense therapeutic measures.
The prosecution Tuesday asked that he be sentenced to life in prison.
The father of the girl, who was tricked into going to his apartment for what she thought was a photo session for jewelry, said Tuesday that Daniel is a sick man and should be locked up for life.
Lucie’s case drew nationwide attention. She was working as an au pair girl in Rieden-bei-Baden in canton Aargau, to improve her German, when she met Daniel during a day trip to Zurich.
The girl’s family later sued the cantonal prison service, which had released him without what the family argued was a suitable plan for the serial offender.
Lucie’s disappearance and murder changed Swiss attitudes towards adopting a nationwide child disappearance alert system, which went into effect in January 2010. Cell phone owners can register to be included, in order to spread the information as quickly and as widely as possible once a child disappears.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Police in canton Valais have arrested a group of 16- and 17-year-olds who have been operating a theft ring in canton Valais, stealing some CHF100,000 worth of goods during 23 robberies. They broke into gas stations, public offices, businesses and shopping centres.
The eight all have police records and the group committed similar crimes in cantons Vaud and Valais. Few of the goods have been recovered.
They stole cigarettes, which they shared among themselves, tools for more break-ins, cash and alcohol. Several safes were stolen.
In addition they stole five cars in the Lake Geneva region, driven the cars on several occasions without licenses and committed a number of infractions. One of the cars was involved in an accident in Geneva and the car damaged to the tune of several thousand francs.
The eight youths in the theft ring are: three Swiss, with one from Geneva and two from canton Vaud, 2 from Kosovo, 1 Algerian, 1 Tunisian and 1 Bosnian. All were taken into custody and several remain there.
Incident occurs 1 week after similar accident in Geneva
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Police in Zurich are seeking witnesses after a car crashed into a Zurich disco, the Lambada, early Friday 10 February, killing one person and injuring five others including the driver. Witnesses told journalists that the driver appeared to steer his car into the building intentionally after driving the wrong way up a one-way street at 05:30.
The 25-year-old driver had had a fight with the owner shortly before the incident. The crash killed a 39-year-old man and injured four other men and one woman, all between the ages of 21 and 36.
A week earlier, a man who had had a fight with a disco employee in Vernier, canton Geneva, drove his car into a group standing in front of the club, injuring three young people.
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – Mizué Bachelard and her seven-year-old daughter who went missing from their home in Chexbres 26 January have been found in southwestern France, thanks to the posters widely distributed along the French autoroutes by French police, according to the Vaud Police office.
A woman who had taken in the pair spotted a poster and contacted police. Mother and daughter are in good condition. Police in canton Vaud have organized for the girl to be returned to her father, in accordance with rulings by the cantonal Justice of the Peace and the Office for Child Protection.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – The tiny island nation of the Maldives, in the Indian Ocean, is in crisis, with President Mahomed Nasheed resigning in the face of a police mutiny. The island is famous for its luxury hotels and resorts, but ABC news in Australia reports that the crisis is largely “invisible” to most visitors, who are whisked away from the airport to holiday destinations where alcohol and bikinis are the norm. The island is otherwise an Islamic state, which strictly observes no alcohol laws and dress codes. Nasheed came to power in 2008 pledging reform, but ran into trouble with the police when he had a long-serving judge arrested for his ties to the president’s predecessor.
Update 10 February: Pair found, now safe. Photos removed to protect family’s privacy
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – Police in two cantons have issued missing persons reports Wednesday 1 February, and they are asking the public for help finding them.
Canton Vaud police say 35-year-old Mizué Bachelard and her 7-year-old daughter Hanaé Noémi disappeared Tuesday evening 31 January from their home in Chexbres.
The mother is “psychologically fragile” say police.
They put out an alert after the mother bought petrol in Bursins, on the A1 autoroute, for her blue Nissan Micra car, Vaud license plates VD 551’987 at 19:40.
She then took money out of a bank cash machine in Versoix and at 09:00 this morning out of a machine in Paris. Mizué Bachelard is 160cm tall, thin and wispy, with chestnut hair (she often wears it tied with a band) and brown eyes. She was last seen wearing a pink pullover, checkered pants or pyjama-style bottoms, and a brown-beige coat.
Her daughter is 120cm tall, thin, with chestnut hair and light blue eyes. She was wearing a red and white striped pullover, dark pants and a blue jacket with a hood.
Police believe the pair may be in Paris.
They ask anyone with information to phone +41 21 644 4444.
Valais youth missing from home since 26 January
Bastien Monnet, 18 years old, has not been seen since the night of 26 January in St Maurice.
Sebastien Monnet, missing from St Maurice
He is 187 cm tall, trim build, dark brown hair cut very short, brown eyes. He was last seen wearing military pants with US Army on them and very large side pockets, a black jacket with hood covered in logos, a black winter jacket with small red and gray motifs and black cloth trainers.
Police in canton Valais are asking anyone with information to contact them at +41 27 326 5656.
Le Nouvelliste says man has been under medical care for psychiatric problems
SION, SWITZERLAND – A Sion judge was attacked and suffered multiple injuries Saturday night 28 January in the city centre. Le Nouvelliste reported Monday morning that a man who has been under medical treatment and who suffers severe psychiatric problems has been arrested and taken to a special detention centre. Police confirmed at 11:00 Monday that a 29-year-old Swiss German who lives in Valais sought medical treatment Sunday morning for injuries he suffered Saturday night. He told medical staff that he was the man who attacked the judge, and he then turned himself into police.
The attack appeared in some way linked to the “Luca” case that has received heavy media attention, particularly in Valais, because the attacker called out “Luca, Luca” and was reported by the judge to say he would pay the magistrate back in kind.
Luca Mongelli is a youth who was badly injured, the victim of a bizarre and vicious attack in Veysonnaz in 2002. The case received heavy media attention at the time and, recently made it back into the news. The boy, age 7 at the time, was found injured and naked, in the snow, in Veysonnaz, after taking the family dog, Rocky, for a walk with Luca’s younger brother Marco. Luca was able to say immediately after the attack that humans had done this to him, but legal and medical analyses at the time showed Rocky to be the attacker, and a drawing done by the very young Marco, as well as his words at the time, pointed to the 30 kg 7-month-old dog. The case was suspended in 2004 and the family has called publicly for further investigation. Luca today is tetraplegic as a result of his injuries.
The Valais attorney general held a press conference on the affair 26 January (details below).
Saturday’s attack was violent and wrongly evoked the Luca case
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – A 32-year-old man shot and killed the father of his ex-girlfriend in Vernier Saturday morning at 10:30, Geneva police say. The man arrived to pick up his daughter, born in 2009, for a weekend visit but a dispute broke out between the man, his ex and her parents, who were visiting. The younger man, a Geneva resident, then shot the older man. Police arrested the gunman in front of the apartment building and despite emergency services arriving quickly on the scene, the victim died there.
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – Yet another armed robbery attempt, the sixth in seven days in canton Vaud, took place Friday night at 18:50 at the Pam grocery store on the rue des Moulins in Yverdon-les-Bains. The masked thief was frightened off without getting anything after the cashier screamed repeatedly and loudly when he pointed a black gun at her and demanded the contents of the cash register.
A manhunt with several police patrols has not turned up the man, who is described by Vaud police as 170cm tall, thin, wearing dark clothes and knitted dark cagoule (mask) with three holes.
Police ask that anyone with information phone them at +41 21 644 4444.
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – A man with a gun held up two people in their 40s as they were closing their business Thursday evening 26 January at 18:30 on the rue de Margencel in Aigle. They gave him an undisclosed sum of money when they were threatened at gunpoint. He then fled and although police were alerted and immediately set up a manhunt, the man has not been found.
His description: he spoke French with an accent “from the East”; 170-175cm tall, thin, dressed in a white shirt with a hood and dark pants; tanned skin.
This is the fifth armed robbery in canton Vaud in one week, with the suspects on the loose in four cases. Police in Lausanne Thursday nabbed thieves who had broken into a Place ST Francois jewelry store at 12:30. A call from outside the store alerted police who arrived quickly and were able to force to the ground and handcuff “several persons” trying to flee. One client inside the shop was slightly injured by a knife.
Bolder thieves: rush hour main street robbery in Rolle
Rolle, main street supermarket robbery Wednesday
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Armed robbers in the Lake Geneva region are getting bolder, with a supermarket hold-up on the main street of Rolle at 19:00 Wednesday night the latest example.
Two masked men broke into the Grand-rue store (police do not mention the Coop at that address specifically) at 19:00, after closing hours and “violently” threatened two of the four employees at gunpoint before making off with an undisclosed sum of money. The two, ages 26 and 30, were in shock but otherwise unharmed, say police.
Two other employees were not directly involved and there were no customers in the store at the time.
The thieves fled “in an unknown direction” and have not been found, despite a significant police search. Anyone with information is asked to contact police at +41 21 644 4444.
Description: 180-190cm tall for the first, both men of average build, wearing dark clothes, with one speaking French with a North African accent.
Valais thieves nabbed
Two thieves, ages 62 and 68, who live in France, were caught in the act of breaking and entering Monday 23 January at 23:00 in Evionnaz, canton Valais. Police were phoned after someone noticed suspicious lights on in an area business, on the Route du Simplon. The building was quickly surrounded and police caught one man attempting to leave the premises and soon found a second man parked at the train station. Stolen goods from three local businesses were found: money, cameras and cell phones.
The two have police records in France, Valais police note.
Vaud, 2 other armed robberies this week: hairdresser’s shop, bank machine client
Earlier this week Vaud police reported two holdups, one Wednesday in Payerne, where a hairdresser was robbed by a man with a knife just as she was closing, and the other a woman in Gland who had just taken money from a bank machine near the post office at midday.
The 44-year-old woman was robbed at gunpoint in Gland at 12:30 Saturday. His description: 20-25-year-old man, European in appearance, 175-180cm tall and thin, dressed in a black sweatshirt with hood, black scarf and gloves, black pistol. He fled in the direction of the train station and has not yet been found.
The Payerne hold-up was also carried out by a thin young man, 175cm in height, wearing dark clothes, speaking French with an accent that could not be identified. He fled the scene and despite a search with dogs and several police patrols, he has not yet been found.
Geneva police arrest 3 on several charges after Sunday night high-speed chase
Police in Geneva have three men, ages 19-23, under arrest following a high-speed chase late Sunday. All three reside in Geneva but are Kosovar, Serbian and Macedonian. The stolen car they were traveling in was spotted by police at the intersection of rue Lect and the routes du Nant-d’Avril and Satigny at 22:00. The driver of the car, instead of stopping when the patrol car put on its flashing lights, took off and led police on a high-speed chase. The car was finally stopped in Meyrin and the men taken into custody, where they admitted to a series of local crimes:
- the car was stolen 14 January when they were stopped by a police officer while they were stealing copper from a Lignon construction site; they escaped in the car, which the police officer managed to photograph, after one of them showed the office a Swiss passport, which turned out to be stolen
- the person whose passport was stolen reported it to Geneva police 16 January, showing a complaint filed earlier in Vaud: his house in canton Vaud had been broken into 3 January and he had filed a complaint with police there for the stolen passport and jewels
- the stolen car was reported by Vaud police in connection with unpaid petrol at a station in Yverdon 20 January
- two of the three held up a woman earlier Sunday evening, at a Vernier car wash, where one said he was a policeman and demanded her wallet; they then fled with the wallet, including her identity papers, which police found when they stopped the men. When they phoned the woman she said she had not yet had a chance to report the theft to police
- the man who had posed as a police officer admitted it and said that he had been driving the stolen car daily, without a license, and that on his own he had robbed a number of villas in Lausanne, Morges, Nyon and Fribourg.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Police in Geneva have arrested a 78-year-old man in the Old Town of the city after he shot and wounded a young man at 04:30 Wednesday 25 January. The 28-year-old victim was hospitalized after being hit in the stomach by a bullet. The shooting occurred after a dispute over noise near a discotheque, with the elderly man shooting from the window of his apartment near Place des Trois-Perdrix.
Drunk driver left scene of Montreux-Vevey accident; 78-year-old woman killed
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – A 78-year-old woman died in hospital Saturday night 21 January shortly after an accident at 22:00 on the A9 autoroute between Vevey and Montreux, in the direction of Vileneuve. The lake side of the road was closed to traffic until 07:15 Sunday for the investigation.
The driver of the second car noticed the car ahead of him too late and despite braking hard he rear-ended the car violently, say canton Vaud police. The two cars ended up crosswise on the highway.
The victim, who lived in north Vaud, was driving a gray Toyota wagon, and police are looking for witnesses or anyone with information, in particular drivers who may have passed her car. She was taken to the Chuv university hospitals, where she died.
The man who crashed into her car is 26 years old, Portuguese and his driver’s license was already suspended. He fled the scene of the accident but turned himself in later. His alcohol level was measured at 1.08.
Anyone with information is asked to go to the nearest police station or to phone +41 21 644 4444.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – A few dozen anti-World Economic Forum protesters, a small crowd estimated by one news agency at 100 persons, were stopped by police from four cantons Saturday 21 January in Bern. The group, which did not have a police permit, was protesting against capitalism and the forum, which starts 24 January in Davos, canton Graubuenden. They were detained while police checked their IDs.
The large police turnout was organized after calls for violence went out, according to one police official quoted by Swiss news agency ats.
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Interpol‘s new red notices and “diffusions”, issued for criminals wanted internationally, grew dramatically in 2011 to 26,000, compared to 16,000 in 2010, bringing the total number of current “wanted” criminals in the system to some 75,000.
Ria Novosti, Russia’s state news service, quotes Interpol head Ronald Noble as saying that the agency, which works with police in most countries, has become much more public in its work, and today about half of the notices are published, compared to just 5 percent in 2000.
Red notices call for the person’s immediate detention for subsequent extradition. A diffusion is an informal arrest warrant, posted on Interpol’s system, to which police worldwide have access.
