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A true crime show solved this man’s murder - MrBallen · Crime and Horror

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Speaker 1: One night in March of 2016, two friends sat on
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Speaker 1: a couch in Lunel, France, watching a true crime show
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Speaker 1: on TV. And the episode really hit close to home, literally,
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Speaker 1: because it was about a missing person who had vanished
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Speaker 1: just miles away from where they lived.
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Speaker 2: And so they're watching the show.
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Speaker 1: And then all of a sudden, in the middle of it,
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Speaker 1: one of the friends suddenly stood up and began pacing
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Speaker 1: around the room, muttering to themselves. And when the other friend,
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Speaker 1: who was still sitting on the couch watching this, asked
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Speaker 1: them what was wrong, they were not ready for the answer.
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Speaker 1: But before we get into today's story, if you're a
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Speaker 1: so you don't miss any of our weekly uploads. Okay,
1:02
Speaker 1: let's get into today's story. At 4.30 p.m. on June 23, 2014,
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Speaker 1: 49-year-old Patrik Iswar hurried out the side door of a
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Speaker 1: hospital in Sète, France, buttoning a fresh-collared shirt as he
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Speaker 1: ran to the parking lot. He climbed onto a scooter
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Speaker 1: and then quickly checked his watch, and then he lifted
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Speaker 1: the kickstand and sped off into traffic, ignoring honks from
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Speaker 1: all the other drivers as he swerved between the cars.
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Speaker 1: Patrik did not care who he was annoying right now,
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Speaker 1: because he was running late for a date, and then
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Speaker 1: right after the date, he had to rush over to
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Speaker 1: his daughter's dance recital. And he desperately wanted to make
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Speaker 1: sure he made both of these events, because they were
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Speaker 1: some of the only things he'd had to look forward
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Speaker 1: to in ages. So things in Patrick's life had not
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Speaker 1: been good for a really long time. Eight years earlier,
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Speaker 1: he had slipped into a rut of serious binge drinking
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Speaker 1: and gambling. And one day when he was drunk, he
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Speaker 1: had actually struck his wife. Following that, his wife had
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Speaker 1: divorced him, and he'd lost custody of his daughter, Alabama,
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Speaker 1: who was now 12 years old.
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Speaker 2: After that, Patrick's life really did not get any better.
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Speaker 1: He had moved in with his elderly mother, and his
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Speaker 1: drinking had only gotten worse, and his gambling continued to
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Speaker 1: the point where he basically gambled away most of what
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Speaker 1: he made by working as a hospital janitor. And then
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Speaker 1: after that, he'd gotten involved with a married co-worker, and
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Speaker 1: then when her husband found out about this affair, she
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Speaker 1: died of an apparent suicide. Her death had been five
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Speaker 1: years earlier, and it had been so dramatic that Patryk
2:50
Speaker 1: had barely dated since. He had just about resigned himself
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Speaker 1: to a life of bachelorhood when, actually a few weeks earlier,
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Speaker 1: he had gotten a call from the woman he was
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Speaker 1: now going to meet, Audrey LeVay. But Patryk was now
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Speaker 1: running so late for his date that he worried Audrey
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Speaker 1: might not wait around for him. So he twisted the
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Speaker 1: throttle of his scooter and shot across an intersection, ignoring
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Speaker 1: more honks from more cars. Patryk had actually met Audrey
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Speaker 1: a long time ago, right after his divorce, and they'd
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Speaker 1: gone out a handful of times before they ultimately lost touch.
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Speaker 1: She was a lot younger than he was, and she'd
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Speaker 1: stood him up more than once in the past. But
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Speaker 1: she was also a lot of fun, and it had
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Speaker 1: been a while since Patryk had been on a date,
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Speaker 1: so when she called him up saying she wanted to
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Speaker 1: go out again, Patryk had said, sure. They'd made plans
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Speaker 1: to meet this afternoon at a park near Patryk's work
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Speaker 1: that had this big rocky hill rising behind it, and
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Speaker 1: the place had some of the best views in the
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Speaker 1: whole city, with the.
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Speaker 2: Ocean on one side.
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Speaker 1: and dramatic cliffs dotted with all these old caves on
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Speaker 1: the other. Now, they were not going to have a
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Speaker 1: whole lot of time together, probably just enough for a
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Speaker 1: short walk before Patrik would have to rush off for
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Speaker 1: his daughter's dance recital later that night. But he hoped
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Speaker 1: that the romantic setting might help spark something between them again.
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Speaker 1: A few minutes later, Patrik pulled up to the park entrance,
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Speaker 1: and to his relief, Audrey was still there waiting for him.
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Speaker 2: So he parked his scooter.
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Speaker 1: And locked his cell phone in the scooter's underseat compartment,
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Speaker 1: and he walked over to her.
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Speaker 2: And from her nervous smile, he.
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Speaker 1: Got the sense that she was almost as excited about
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Speaker 1: the date as he was, which gave him a nice
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Speaker 1: boost of confidence. So he took her hand and they
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Speaker 1: started down the path. Around 8 a.m. the next morning,
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Speaker 1: 10 miles up the coastline from where Patrik and Audrey
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Speaker 1: had been walking at that park, Patrik's older brother, Mark Iswar,
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Speaker 1: stood on the deck of his boat, pulling a big
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Speaker 1: oyster trap out of the water. As he was doing this,
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Speaker 1: his phone rang, so he stopped and he answered it.
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Speaker 1: But before he could even say hello, his mother's very
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Speaker 1: worried voice came across the line, asking if he knew.
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Speaker 2: Where Patrik was.
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Speaker 1: Mark frowned, because Patrik lived with their mother, so she
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Speaker 1: should know better than he would. But his mother explained
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Speaker 1: that Patrik hadn't come home last night. He also wasn't
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Speaker 1: answering his phone, he hadn't shown up to work that morning,
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Speaker 1: and perhaps most concerning of all, he'd missed his daughter's
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Speaker 1: dance recital the previous evening. And it was this last
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Speaker 1: fact that made Mark think that something might actually be
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Speaker 1: wrong here, because he knew how much Patrick loved his
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Speaker 1: daughter and how.
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Speaker 2: Much he was looking forward to that recital.
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Speaker 1: So he promised his mother he would get to the
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Speaker 1: bottom of it. Then he hung up and began calling
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Speaker 1: Patrick's friends. However, with each conversation he had, Mark got
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Speaker 1: more worried because nobody had heard from Patrick since yesterday afternoon.
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Speaker 1: He'd apparently left work around 4 p.m., but he hadn't
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Speaker 1: told anybody where he was going. Now, for Mark, he
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Speaker 1: felt like this was at least somewhere to start.
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Speaker 2: Patryk's work.
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Speaker 1: So he steered his boat to the dock, tied it off,
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Speaker 1: and then jumped in his car and started heading that direction.
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Speaker 1: Four hours later, Mark stood on a rocky lookout point
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Speaker 1: scanning the city below. Patryk's hospital stood in the middle
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Speaker 1: of Set's business district, which was packed.
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Speaker 2: With canals and cafes and tourist spots.
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Speaker 1: And Mark and a handful of Patryk's friends had spent
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Speaker 1: all morning checking them one by one, looking for Patryk.
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Speaker 2: But they hadn't found him or any sign of him.
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Speaker 1: And so now Mark had turned his focus to some
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Speaker 1: of the more remote areas around the city, like the
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Speaker 1: hill behind the park where he now stood.
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Speaker 2: But there was still no sign of Patryk anywhere. And
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Speaker 2: so Mark was trying to think of anywhere else his
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Speaker 2: brother might have gone when his phone rang.
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Speaker 1: It was one of Patryk's friends from the search party,
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Speaker 1: and he'd just found Patryk's scooter outside the park at
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Speaker 1: the bottom of the hill, just a short drive from
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Speaker 1: where Mark was. And so Mark told him not to
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Speaker 1: touch anything, and he sprinted back to his car, and
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Speaker 1: he sped down the hill, and he left the park...
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Speaker 1: And he stopped in the parking lot right outside. And
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Speaker 1: sure enough, there in the lot was Patrik's scooter. And
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Speaker 1: as Mark looked at the scooter and at the quiet
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Speaker 1: park all around him, he felt a cold weight settle
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Speaker 1: in his stomach. Because he really couldn't think of any
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Speaker 1: reason why Patrik would leave his scooter here overnight. In
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Speaker 1: the back of his mind all day, Mark had been
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Speaker 1: worried that something bad could have happened to his little brother.
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Speaker 1: But now, after seeing the scooter, he felt sure of it.
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Speaker 1: Almost two weeks later, at 8 a.m. on July 5, 2014,
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Speaker 1: Detective Boris Verriere took the exit ramp toward the French
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Speaker 1: town of Sète. And as the sunlight hit his windshield,
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Speaker 1: he had to squint as he looked out at the
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Speaker 1: long stretch of beaches and canals framed by these beautiful
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Speaker 1: rocky cliffs in a small, dense urban center. Verriere was
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Speaker 1: a senior investigator from the nearby city of Montpellier, but
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Speaker 1: he had just been called in to take over a
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Speaker 1: missing persons case that had stumped the local police in Sète.
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Speaker 1: About two weeks earlier, 49-year-old Patrik Iswar had disappeared after
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Speaker 1: going on a date with a woman whose name was
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Speaker 1: Audrey Louvet. The local police had already spoken to Audrey,
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Speaker 1: who said she didn't know what had happened to Patrik.
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Speaker 2: She said they had gone for a walk, and then
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Speaker 2: he had escorted her to her.
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Speaker 1: Bus, and then after that, she'd assumed that Patrik just
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Speaker 1: sort of went back to his scooter and carried on
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Speaker 1: with his night. But the scooter had been found the
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Speaker 1: next day, still parked, where he and Audrey had met
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Speaker 1: up for their date, with no sign of Patrik anywhere nearby.
8:09
Speaker 1: And now, almost two weeks later, Patryk had still not
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Speaker 1: turned up. Since then, Patryk's brother, Mark, had been helping
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Speaker 1: the investigation. Verrier had spoken to Mark on the phone,
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Speaker 1: and Mark had talked about Patryk like he was a saint,
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Speaker 1: a guy who would drop everything to help out somebody
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Speaker 1: in a jam, who never got into fights and had
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Speaker 1: really no enemies. But Verrier didn't necessarily believe this, because
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Speaker 1: in his experience, people who inexplicably vanished oftentimes were kidnapped
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Speaker 1: or murdered. Now, he had no reason to actually suspect
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Speaker 1: that around Patrick. You know, he could have just as
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Speaker 1: easily gotten into an accident, you know, fallen off a cliff,
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Speaker 1: or maybe he chose to vanish. But at this point,
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Speaker 1: what Verrier really needed to do was, on his own,
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Speaker 1: dig into who Patrick was and figure out if there
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Speaker 1: was a reason why he wasn't here right now.
9:01
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Speaker 1: in the freezer aisle of your local grocery store. A
10:00
Speaker 1: few minutes later, Verriere followed Patrick's ex-wife, whose name was
10:04
Speaker 1: Claude Ozize, into her living room, and they both sat down.
10:07
Speaker 1: Verriere switched on his recording device, and he asked Claude
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Speaker 1: where she was on the day Patrick went missing. Claude
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Speaker 1: said it was just an ordinary Monday for her, and
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Speaker 1: that after work, she had picked up their daughter, Alabama,
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Speaker 1: from school and driven her to her dance recital. She
10:22
Speaker 1: had expected to meet Patrick there at the recital, and
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Speaker 1: it really surprised her when he didn't show up, because
10:28
Speaker 1: even though Patrick had plenty of.
10:29
Speaker 2: Flaws, he was a good dad.
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Speaker 1: And at that, Merriere sort of leaned forward, because Patrick's
10:35
Speaker 1: flaws were actually what he wanted to know about. Now,
10:38
Speaker 1: he didn't think Claude was guilty of anything here, since
10:41
Speaker 1: she had a pretty strong alibi and didn't really stand
10:43
Speaker 1: to benefit from Patrique's disappearance, but he hoped she could
10:47
Speaker 1: maybe tell him about any old habits or current habits
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Speaker 1: that could have gotten Patrique into trouble. And so when
10:53
Speaker 1: he asked her about this, Claude hesitated before saying she
10:57
Speaker 1: really didn't want to badmouth Patrique, but he drank and
11:00
Speaker 1: gambled a lot more than he should. At this point,
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Speaker 1: Verriere pressed her for more details, but Claude just insisted
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Speaker 1: that Patrique had really always kept that part of his
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Speaker 1: life away from her. But after she thought about it
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Speaker 1: for a moment, She said there was someone who might
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Speaker 1: be able to tell Verriere more. And then she called
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Speaker 1: their 12-year-old daughter, Alabama, into the room. Alabama appeared very
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Speaker 1: visibly nervous and shaken up by everything going on with
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Speaker 1: her dad. But her mother, Claude, took her hand and
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Speaker 1: encouraged her to share her story.
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Speaker 2: And slowly, the girl began to speak.
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Speaker 1: She said that about a week before her dad disappeared,
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Speaker 1: he'd brought her along on a very strange errand. They'd
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Speaker 1: parked outside of a tunnel, and he'd told her to
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Speaker 1: wait in the car. And then he got out and
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Speaker 1: walked into this tunnel to meet with someone.
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Speaker 2: It was a man.
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Speaker 1: But it was too dark in the tunnel for Alabama
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Speaker 1: to make out the man's features. But she definitely saw
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Speaker 1: her father, Patrick, hand this man some kind of package
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Speaker 1: before he quickly.
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Speaker 2: Turned and ran back to the car. And then afterwards,
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Speaker 2: her father wouldn't tell her who this man was. He
12:01
Speaker 2: just said that he'd done something really stupid. And because
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Speaker 2: of it, he now owed some people a lot of money.
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Speaker 1: After Alabama finished talking, her mother, Claude, thanked her and
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Speaker 1: sent her back out of the room. And then once
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Speaker 1: she was gone, Verriere asked Claude if she knew who
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Speaker 1: this man in the tunnel might be.
12:16
Speaker 2: But Claude said she had no idea.
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Speaker 1: But she said she did have one name that was
12:20
Speaker 1: worth looking into. Now, this was not someone who would
12:23
Speaker 1: have lent Patryk any money.
12:25
Speaker 2: But instead, it was a.
12:26
Speaker 1: Man who held a personal grudge against him. His name
12:29
Speaker 1: was Remy Shen, and he was a local hairstylist. An
12:36
Speaker 1: hour later, Verrier sat in a cramped cubicle of the
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Speaker 1: SET police station, scrolling through.
12:41
Speaker 2: A file on his laptop.
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Speaker 1: Based on Claude's tip, he'd looked up the hairstylist's name
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Speaker 1: in the police database and had immediately found a connection
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Speaker 1: to Patryk. Back in 2009, so a few years after
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Speaker 1: Patryk's divorce, Patryk had been questioned as a witness in
12:55
Speaker 1: the suicide of Remy Shen's wife, a woman named Nadezhda Shen,
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Speaker 1: who had worked with Patryk at the hospitals. Apparently, Nadege
13:03
Speaker 1: had come home after a work party and confessed to
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Speaker 1: Remy that she'd been having this affair with Patryk. The
13:09
Speaker 1: couple argued for hours about it and Nadege ended up
13:12
Speaker 1: sleeping on the couch while Remy went upstairs to their bedroom.
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Speaker 1: And then the next day, Remy found Nadege in their
13:18
Speaker 1: garage hanging by the neck. As soon as Verrier was
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Speaker 1: done reading this, he knew he finally had a suspect.
13:24
Speaker 1: And so he looked up Remy's last known address and
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Speaker 1: contact information.
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Speaker 2: At around 10 a.m.
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Speaker 1: The next day, so July 7th, Verriere followed Remy Chen
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Speaker 1: into an interrogation room at the SEP police station and
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Speaker 1: shut the door behind them. Remy was a short, wiry
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Speaker 1: man with a very obvious scowl on his face that
13:42
Speaker 1: made it clear he thought he was being very inconvenienced here.
13:46
Speaker 1: Verriere immediately got the feeling that Remy would likely only
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Speaker 1: crack under intense pressure. So, right away, he tried to
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Speaker 1: shake Remy by saying they knew he was involved in
13:57
Speaker 1: the kidnapping of Patrick Iswar. Now, this was a total bluff,
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Speaker 1: because Verriere did not actually have any evidence, but he
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Speaker 1: wanted to see how Remy would react. And to his surprise,
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Speaker 1: and irritation, Remy just laughed. Remy acted like he literally
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Speaker 1: had no idea who Verriere was even talking about. And
14:15
Speaker 1: when Verriere brought up his late wife and sort of
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Speaker 1: insinuated that obviously Patrique had had an affair and was
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Speaker 1: a witness when she had died, Remy just scoffed and
14:24
Speaker 1: reminded him that it had been five years since her passing.
14:27
Speaker 1: He said he had moved on and begun dating other people.
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Speaker 1: And anyways, it was sort of absurd to think that
14:32
Speaker 1: he would hold a grudge for five years without doing anything,
14:35
Speaker 1: but then suddenly now decide to take some sort of
14:38
Speaker 1: revenge out of the blue. It just didn't add up.
14:40
Speaker 1: But Verrier didn't really know what to make of this.
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Speaker 1: It seemed like Remy was really confident, almost too confident.
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Speaker 1: And so he pivoted and just asked Remy where he
14:49
Speaker 1: was on June 23rd, the day Patryk went missing. And
14:52
Speaker 1: after thinking for a moment, Remy just said that he
14:55
Speaker 1: had spent the whole afternoon alone cleaning out a storage
14:59
Speaker 1: unit that he had rented. This was obviously not a
15:02
Speaker 1: great alibi at all. But at this point, Verrier had
15:05
Speaker 1: no choice but to let Remy go. As Verriere watched
15:08
Speaker 1: Remy leave, he knew he was running out of time here.
15:11
Speaker 1: I mean, two weeks had already passed since Patrick's disappearance,
15:14
Speaker 1: and every day the odds of finding him alive got worse.
15:18
Speaker 1: So out of desperation, Verriere decided to circle back to
15:21
Speaker 1: the very start and speak again to Audrey Louvet. I mean,
15:26
Speaker 1: being the last person to see Patrick before he went missing,
15:29
Speaker 1: Audrey was an obvious person of interest. But Verriere wasn't
15:33
Speaker 1: sure what more he could learn from her. The local
15:35
Speaker 1: police had already questioned her at the very beginning of
15:38
Speaker 1: the investigation, and Verriere had already watched that interview tape
15:41
Speaker 1: a number of times.
15:43
Speaker 2: But Verriere knew he just.
15:44
Speaker 1: Had to take a shot, so he picked up the
15:46
Speaker 1: phone and he called Audrey into the station. Later that
15:50
Speaker 1: same afternoon, around 2 p.m., Verriere sat across from Audrey
15:54
Speaker 1: in the same room where he just interviewed Remy.
15:56
Speaker 2: He said hello to her and he started the recorder.
15:58
Speaker 1: And then he asked her to explain her history with
16:01
Speaker 1: Patrick again. And at first, her answers were all just
16:04
Speaker 1: like they'd been on the tape.
16:06
Speaker 2: She said they had met eight years.
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Speaker 1: Ago in 2006, and they dated casually for a while
16:11
Speaker 1: before losing contact. And then, just a few weeks ago,
16:14
Speaker 1: she happened to pass the bar where they first met,
16:17
Speaker 1: and it made her think of Petrie. So she'd called
16:19
Speaker 1: him up out of the blue to ask how he
16:20
Speaker 1: was doing, and they'd ultimately made plans to see each
16:23
Speaker 1: other again. She described their date as being a short
16:25
Speaker 1: walk around the park. after which Patryk had walked her
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Speaker 1: to the bus stop and then headed off, presumably to
16:31
Speaker 1: go back to his scooter and to head off to
16:33
Speaker 1: his daughter's dance recital. And that's when Verrier interrupted, and
16:37
Speaker 1: he asked Audrey to tell him specifically which direction Patryk
16:41
Speaker 1: had headed off after dropping her off at the bus stop.
16:44
Speaker 1: And Audrey sat there for a minute, and then she said,
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Speaker 1: you know, I can't remember. And this really bothered Verriere,
16:50
Speaker 1: because here was this person who should be able to
16:53
Speaker 1: tell him the most about Patrick's last moves, and she
16:56
Speaker 1: had basically nothing useful to offer the investigation. So Verriere
17:00
Speaker 1: just sort of dropped the polite tone and really went
17:02
Speaker 1: after her. He told her he wasn't buying her act,
17:05
Speaker 1: and that she needed to tell him everything she knew
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Speaker 1: right now, or this was all going to get much,
17:11
Speaker 1: much worse for her. Audrey's eyes went wide, and her
17:14
Speaker 1: voice began to shake as she insisted that she'd already
17:17
Speaker 1: told them everything But Verriere didn't let up. He kept
17:20
Speaker 1: demanding that she just admit what she'd done until he
17:23
Speaker 1: was practically shouting at her. And Audrey was in tears,
17:27
Speaker 1: and she was repeating over and over that Patrick had
17:29
Speaker 1: been fine when she left him. She just didn't remember
17:31
Speaker 1: all the details. And finally, Verriere backed off. He'd run
17:35
Speaker 1: countless interrogations throughout his career, and his gut was starting
17:38
Speaker 1: to tell him that Audrey's fragility was not.
17:41
Speaker 2: Really an act here.
17:42
Speaker 1: He'd pushed her as hard as he could, and he
17:45
Speaker 1: had to admit that maybe she was just telling the truth.
17:49
Speaker 1: A little while later, after Audrey was gone, Verriere sat
17:52
Speaker 1: alone inside the interrogation room, thinking about the case. He
17:55
Speaker 1: hadn't managed to rule out any suspects yet, and he
17:58
Speaker 1: still had no idea who that mysterious man in the
18:01
Speaker 1: tunnel might be. And on top of all that, there
18:03
Speaker 1: was still the possibility that no crime had been committed here,
18:06
Speaker 1: since they had no body. I mean, who knows what
18:08
Speaker 1: really happened to Patryk at this point? And Verriere knew
18:11
Speaker 1: that there were just too many unknowns. And Verriere knew
18:15
Speaker 1: that if the case was ever going to gain real traction,
18:18
Speaker 1: they needed to find Patrique, dead or alive.
18:26
Speaker 2: Around 11 a.m.
18:28
Speaker 1: On July 17th, so three and a half weeks after
18:31
Speaker 1: Patrique Izoard disappeared, Detective Boris Verriere parked along the shoulder
18:35
Speaker 1: of a winding roadside in the French town of Sète.
18:38
Speaker 1: He got out of his car, he stooped beneath a
18:40
Speaker 1: strip of yellow police tape, and he headed across the
18:43
Speaker 1: long strip of dry grass leading up to a sheer
18:46
Speaker 1: cliff wall. A dozen yards ahead of him, barely visible
18:49
Speaker 1: in the rock face, was the dark, round opening of
18:52
Speaker 1: a cave. A few hours earlier, a group of teenagers
18:56
Speaker 1: had shown up at the police station, seeming very frazzled,
18:59
Speaker 1: saying they had found a human body inside of that cave.
19:02
Speaker 1: And as soon as Verriere had heard about this, he
19:04
Speaker 1: had rushed to the scene, because the cave was less
19:07
Speaker 1: than a half a mile away from where Patrick's scooter
19:10
Speaker 1: had been abandoned. And so now, Verriere turned on his
19:12
Speaker 1: flashlight and he stepped into the cave. And as soon
19:15
Speaker 1: as he did, a forensics team fell into step.
19:17
Speaker 2: Right behind him.
19:18
Speaker 1: And together, they began making their way into the darkness.
19:22
Speaker 1: Thanks to his flashlight, Verriere could see that the walls
19:24
Speaker 1: were covered in graffiti and that there were empty bottles
19:27
Speaker 1: and other garbage everywhere. So it seemed like this was
19:30
Speaker 1: probably a popular party spot for young people. As they
19:33
Speaker 1: moved deeper, the cave split off into a maze of
19:37
Speaker 1: all these different narrow tunnels. And just as Verriere was
19:39
Speaker 1: about to direct his team... to spread out and begin
19:42
Speaker 1: searching all of them, he passed by one of these
19:45
Speaker 1: tunnels that absolutely reeked. And so verrier stopped what he
19:49
Speaker 1: was doing and just aimed his flashlight down this particular
19:51
Speaker 1: tunnel and he saw there was a shallow pit dug
19:54
Speaker 1: into the floor and lying at the bottom of this
19:57
Speaker 1: pit was what looked like a ragged lump of black
19:59
Speaker 1: fabric until verrier stepped closer the smell was overpowering now
20:04
Speaker 1: and verrier knew he was standing over the charred remains
20:08
Speaker 1: of a human body Verriere bent down to examine it,
20:11
Speaker 1: and he saw right away there was what appeared to
20:13
Speaker 1: be a bullet hole in the skull and a bullet
20:16
Speaker 1: hole to the torso. And those details, one to the head,
20:19
Speaker 1: one to the stomach, and then, you know, the body
20:21
Speaker 1: being burnt afterwards, likely to get rid of evidence, felt
20:26
Speaker 1: very familiar to Verriere. It felt like this could have
20:29
Speaker 1: been a mob hit. A year and a half later,
20:40
Speaker 1: so just before Christmas of 2015, Detective Verriere was in
20:44
Speaker 1: his office in Montpellier when his phone rang. It was
20:47
Speaker 1: Patrique's older brother, Mark, calling to ask for updates on
20:50
Speaker 1: his brother's case, again. And Verriere sighed because the truth was,
20:54
Speaker 1: he had nothing new to report. The body in the
20:57
Speaker 1: cave had been confirmed to be Patrique, and so Verriere
21:00
Speaker 1: had hoped that that discovery would lead to all these
21:03
Speaker 1: new leads. But after scouring the cave for clues and
21:07
Speaker 1: testing the cigarettes from the scene for DNA, and speaking
21:10
Speaker 1: to the teenagers who reported the body, the case just
21:13
Speaker 1: hit a dead end. Now, the mob-like execution style did
21:17
Speaker 1: line up with a theory that Verriere had that, you know,
21:20
Speaker 1: maybe Patryk had been killed over gambling debt, you know,
21:23
Speaker 1: by the mob, basically, or someone who was affiliated with,
21:25
Speaker 1: you know, organized crime. But Verriere had never been able
21:29
Speaker 1: to actually uncover any trace of Patryk having any sort
21:32
Speaker 1: of debt that would get him killed. Also, he still
21:35
Speaker 1: had not been able to identify that mysterious man in
21:38
Speaker 1: the tunnel that Patrick's daughter had mentioned. And so that
21:41
Speaker 1: left Remy and also Audrey as his only suspects. And
21:45
Speaker 1: Verriere had placed both of them under surveillance. But so far,
21:49
Speaker 1: neither of them had done anything suspicious. So the investigation
21:52
Speaker 1: was now stuck. And Verriere understood that Patrick's family was
21:57
Speaker 1: really out of patience here. So he was not surprised
21:59
Speaker 1: that when he admitted he still was not.
22:01
Speaker 2: Ready to make an arrest... Mark snapped.
22:04
Speaker 1: He told Verriere that if the police weren't capable of
22:07
Speaker 1: solving this, he was going to take matters into his
22:09
Speaker 1: own hands. Three months later, on a night in March
22:13
Speaker 1: of 2016, Detective Verriere sat down on his couch in
22:16
Speaker 1: his living room to watch something that he'd been warned
22:19
Speaker 1: was coming. Mark had convinced the producers of a national
22:23
Speaker 1: true crime TV show to do an episode on his
22:25
Speaker 1: brother's case. And the episode was airing tonight. And as
22:29
Speaker 1: the show started, Verriere felt a nod of anxiety. because
22:34
Speaker 1: Mark knew details about the investigation that were not meant
22:37
Speaker 1: for the public. And if he shared them on the show,
22:40
Speaker 1: it could seriously compromise the case. But obviously, Verrier was
22:43
Speaker 1: also just curious to see how the episode had turned out.
22:47
Speaker 1: And part of him hoped that maybe renewed public attention
22:50
Speaker 1: might actually help the case. And as Verrier watched the show,
22:54
Speaker 1: he was relieved to see that Mark wasn't there to
22:56
Speaker 1: talk about case specifics. He was there to talk about Patrik.
23:00
Speaker 1: Mark described his brother as this When the show ended,
23:03
Speaker 1: Verriere did not really feel worried anymore that anything that
23:05
Speaker 1: had been revealed on the show was sensitive or that
23:07
Speaker 1: it could negatively impact the actual investigation. But he also
23:24
Speaker 1: knew that, you know, the impact the show was going
23:26
Speaker 1: to have was probably going to be pretty small. Like,
23:28
Speaker 1: he didn't expect anything to come of this plea for
23:31
Speaker 1: help from the public. However, he would be wrong, because
23:35
Speaker 1: the next morning, Verrier's phone would ring. And an hour
23:39
Speaker 1: after that call came in, Verrier was ringing the doorbell
23:43
Speaker 1: of an apartment building in Lunel, which is a town
23:45
Speaker 1: close to set. A woman would answer the door, and
23:48
Speaker 1: when Verrier flashed his badge, she invited him inside. The woman,
23:52
Speaker 1: whose name was Sophie, had reached out to the police
23:55
Speaker 1: after watching Mark's interview on TV, saying she did have
23:58
Speaker 1: information about Patrick's case. And so Verriere followed her into
24:01
Speaker 1: her kitchen, and he sat down across the table from her,
24:05
Speaker 1: and he turned on his recorder, and he told her
24:07
Speaker 1: to just start from the beginning. And the moment the
24:09
Speaker 1: story began to spell out, Verriere knew he'd solved the case.
24:18
Speaker 1: Based on the evidence collected at the crime scene and
24:20
Speaker 1: witness testimony, The following is a reconstruction of what police
24:24
Speaker 1: believe happened to Patrik Izwar on the afternoon of Monday,
24:27
Speaker 1: June 23, 2014. At 4.30 p.m., the killer stood on
24:37
Speaker 1: a rocky hill overlooking a park and set, watching through
24:41
Speaker 1: a pair of binoculars while Patrik and Audrey walked hand-in-hand
24:45
Speaker 1: down a paved path below. The couple was taking their time,
24:48
Speaker 1: clearly enjoying the scenery and each other's company. And then
24:52
Speaker 1: at some point, Audrey stopped and pointed across the road
24:55
Speaker 1: at a cave in the nearby cliffs, the entrance to
24:58
Speaker 1: a cave. And when the killer saw this, their heart
25:00
Speaker 1: began to race, and they watched intently as the couple
25:03
Speaker 1: actually crossed the road.
25:05
Speaker 2: And went into the cave and vanished.
25:07
Speaker 1: At this point, the killer lowered their binoculars and put
25:10
Speaker 1: them inside of the large duffel bag they had brought
25:13
Speaker 1: with them. Then, after slinging this bag, they hustled down
25:17
Speaker 1: the hill and went right to the entrance of the cave.
25:20
Speaker 1: When they reached the entrance to the cave, they stopped,
25:23
Speaker 1: and they put that bag on the ground. They unzipped it,
25:26
Speaker 1: and out of it they pulled a large rifle, a
25:28
Speaker 1: roll of duct tape, and also a white mask. The
25:31
Speaker 1: killer put the mask on, and with the rifle and
25:33
Speaker 1: tape in hand, they entered the cave. And they could
25:36
Speaker 1: hear the sound of Patrick and Audrey inside. They had
25:39
Speaker 1: not gone far, and they clearly had not clocked the
25:41
Speaker 1: killer coming in. They were sort of wrapped up in
25:43
Speaker 1: their date.
25:44
Speaker 2: However, when the.
25:45
Speaker 1: Killer got close enough, the couple heard their footsteps... and
25:49
Speaker 1: they turned around. When Audrey saw the killer in their
25:53
Speaker 1: mask with the gun, she began to scream, and Patryk,
25:56
Speaker 1: he just went white as a ghost. Before the couple
25:58
Speaker 1: could even react, the killer threw the duct tape at
26:01
Speaker 1: Audrey and told her that if she wanted to live,
26:03
Speaker 1: she would do exactly as instructed. Then the killer told
26:06
Speaker 1: Audrey to use this tape and bind Patryk's wrists and ankles.
26:11
Speaker 1: And at first, Audrey just stood there in stunned silence,
26:14
Speaker 1: but eventually she composed herself and she obeyed.
26:17
Speaker 2: And as she was binding.
26:19
Speaker 1: Patryk, Patryk just also stood there in stunned silence, not
26:22
Speaker 1: really sure what to even do. When Audrey was done,
26:25
Speaker 1: the killer told her to leave the cave and to
26:27
Speaker 1: not say anything about what had happened here. She hesitated
26:30
Speaker 1: just long enough to glance back at Patryk, but then
26:33
Speaker 1: she turned and she ran. Once her footsteps had faded,
26:36
Speaker 1: and it was just the killer and Patryk inside of
26:38
Speaker 1: this cave, Patryk just stared, wondering what was going to
26:41
Speaker 1: happen to him. And the killer, after making really intense
26:44
Speaker 1: eye contact with Patryk, raised his rifle, and shot Patryk
26:49
Speaker 1: in the head.
26:49
Speaker 2: And also once in the chest, and Patryk crumpled to
26:52
Speaker 2: the ground.
26:53
Speaker 1: At that point, the killer slung his rifle, and then
26:55
Speaker 1: he grabbed Patryk by the ankles, and he dragged his
26:58
Speaker 1: body down a nearby tunnel and dumped him in that
27:00
Speaker 1: shallow pit. Then the killer doused the body with lighter
27:03
Speaker 1: fluid from a canister they'd brought in that bag. They
27:06
Speaker 1: lit a match and tossed it in. As Patryk's body
27:09
Speaker 1: began to burn, the killer walked out of the cave
27:12
Speaker 1: and pulled off their mask as soon as they stepped
27:14
Speaker 1: into the light. They now had only one thing left
27:17
Speaker 1: to do. Go find Audrey and explain everything, and convince
27:22
Speaker 1: her not to go to the police. Because the killer
27:25
Speaker 1: was Remy Shen, the hairstylist who hated Patryk for having
27:29
Speaker 1: an affair with his late wife, and he had just
27:32
Speaker 1: successfully tricked Audrey into helping him pull this murder off.
27:37
Speaker 2: It would turn out, Audrey was actually Remy's ex-girlfriend.
27:41
Speaker 1: They had met and begun dating in 2009, shortly after
27:44
Speaker 1: the death of Remy's wife. And Remy had realized that
27:48
Speaker 1: because of Audrey's history with Patryk, because they had also dated,
27:51
Speaker 1: he could use her to lure Patryk into a trap
27:55
Speaker 1: and finally take his revenge. But even though Audrey was
27:58
Speaker 1: clearly a key part of this plan, she didn't actually
28:01
Speaker 1: know that Remy was going to kill Patryk. Remy had
28:04
Speaker 1: told her a sob story about Patryk owing him a
28:06
Speaker 1: lot of money, and she thought they were just going
28:08
Speaker 1: to scare him into paying up. It was not until
28:11
Speaker 1: she got into the cave and Remy showed up with
28:13
Speaker 1: a mask on and a rifle that she realized he
28:16
Speaker 1: had something way more sinister in his mind. After the murder,
28:20
Speaker 1: Remy convinced Audrey to stay silent by threatening to kill
28:23
Speaker 1: her and her children. And for over a year, she
28:26
Speaker 1: kept a secret, lying to the police the whole time.
28:29
Speaker 1: But when she watched that true crime episode about the
28:32
Speaker 1: case and saw Mark's plea for information, she finally just
28:36
Speaker 1: cracked and confessed to her friend Sophie, who was watching
28:39
Speaker 1: the show with her, who then went on to call
28:41
Speaker 1: the police the very next day. On March 31st, 2016,
28:44
Speaker 1: Remy Chen and Audrey Louvet were.
28:47
Speaker 2: Arrested for their roles in Patrick's death.
28:50
Speaker 1: Remy received 30 years in prison for murder, and Audrey
28:52
Speaker 1: was sentenced to 12 years for acting as an accessory
28:55
Speaker 1: to the kidnapping.
29:05
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for watching.
29:06
Speaker 1: Let me know what you thought of today's episode in
29:08
Speaker 1: the comments, And remember, we have a whole playlist of
29:11
Speaker 1: true crime episodes ready for you to binge right now.
29:14
Speaker 2: So click here and give them a watch. All right,
29:17
Speaker 2: until next time, see ya.