A British conman that included in a Netflix docudrama has truly been punished to six years behind bars by a French court docket for deliberately ramming 2 legislation enforcement officers together with his automobiles and truck as he tried an escape.
Robert Hendy-Freegard, 53, nicknamed the Puppet Master as a result of his job as a serial trickster, made his retreat after harming the gendarmes at his residence within the Creuse in fundamental France.
He was apprehended in Belgium and extradited to France, the place he has truly remained in jail contemplating that 2022.
Hendy-Freegard was based responsible and supplied a life sentence within the UK in 2005 for kidnapping and scams, consisting of ripping off quite a lot of females out of higher than ₤ 1m.
He had truly persuaded his targets he was a scout for MI5 and obtained on the run from terrorist organisations. He was launched in 2009 after his sentence for kidnapping was reversed by a allure court docket.
Some time round 2015 he relocated to a distant residence within the city of Vidaillat, within the Creuse, and developed himself as a pet canine breeder together with his British companion, Sandra Clifton.
When workplace and pet well-being examiners, include by gendarmes, checked out the residential or business property on 25 August 2022 to judge the kennels after grievances from neighbors that he was operating an illegal group, Hendy-Freegard apparently repelled in his Audi A3, hanging the policemans on the identical time.
A girls policeman was supposedly lugged 100 backyards on the auto’s hood, broken her nostril and was licensed off assist 21 days, whereas her male coworker was licensed off for six days.
Hendy-Freegard was apprehended 2 weeks in a while after his automobiles and truck was dropped in Belgian cops on the E40 freeway at Grand Bigard nearBrussels He was initially implicated of tried homicide nevertheless this was in a while altered to a payment of bodily violence versus public authorities with intensifying conditions.
Hendy-Freegard, that confirmed up in court docket in Gu éret below the title David Hendy, refuted deliberately hanging each gendarmes.
The court docket listened to that whereas on the run he despatched out a message to a French gendarme he acknowledged, stating: “I just wanted to say that I apologise to your colleagues who jumped in front of me. I’m horrified that they might have thought I wanted to murder them.”
He knowledgeable the court docket he had truly been disturbed that day since Clifton had truly launched she was leaving him. “First of all, I’m sorry I didn’t stop. But I panicked … I didn’t stop because I’m a human being with emotions,” he acknowledged.
He criticized the Netflix docudrama for triggering misery and emotional troubles. “There are always two sides to every story. I made mistakes that day, but you have no idea what I went through, even though I’m not a physical victim. But none of this would have happened if the Netflix documentary hadn’t been shown,” he acknowledged.
He knowledgeable the listening to he and Clifton had truly relocated to France after she noticed a promotion for the residential or business property in a distant space inVidaillat Asked what earnings he contended the second, he responded: “I’d need to clarify that point.”
The court docket listened to that the residential or business property, the place the pair ran a corporation reproducing beagles, was worn out and Hendy-Freegard acknowledged troubles triggered by Brexit had truly averted them from refurbishing it.
While on the kennels, the policemans discovered Clifton dwelling on the residential or business property. Neighbours had truly previously notified the authorities regarding a feminine they believed was being saved in “awful conditions” at your own home, nevertheless as the feminine knowledgeable cops there was no cause for fear, questions have been gone down.
Clifton is assumed to have truly contemplating that gone again to the UK and decreased to push charges.
Hendy-Freegard, birthed in 1971 in Worksop, was the principle quantity in Netflix’s 2022 docudrama The Puppet Master: Hunting the Ultimate Conman and moreover motivated the film Rogue Agent, an imaginary story starring James Norton and Gemma Arterton.
The state district lawyer, Alexandra Pethieu, had truly requested for a seven-year jail sentence, stating the retreat effort precipitated “an appalling scene worthy of Mad Max”.
During an earlier listening to, Hendy-Freegard’s lawyer, Juliette Magne-Gandois, acknowledged he had “always denied any intent to kill anyone”, a payment deliver a sentence of roughly three a long time. Agence France-Presse reported that Magne-Gandois had truly contemplating that give up representing him.
During his London check, the court docket was knowledgeable Hendy-Freegard obeyed the adage: “Lies have to be big to be convincing.” One of his targets remembered him taking her from an anticipated “safe house” with a pail over her head, needing to hide in cupboards to remain away from website guests, and investing 3 weeks in a secured washroom with little to eat.
