January 13, 2003

In-laws held over Paris bomb 'plot'

French police have arrested the former parents-in-law of an airport baggage handler who had explosives and weapons planted in his car in an attempt to frame him.
[...]
The baggage handler, Abderazak Besseghir, insisted that he had been set up by his in-laws, who blamed him for the death of his wife in a fire.

Last week a former Foreign Legion soldier admitted planting the evidence in Mr Besseghir's car.
[...]
But police said they were unable to find anything linking Mr Besseghir to extremists, and his fingerprints were not on the weapons.

Investigators gradually began to take seriously his claims that he was the victim of an elaborate set-up.

Only in France these days, huh?
I don't know what the truth is behind this story, but all the people involved sound completely crazy.
Maybe they didn't catch an Islamist terrorist this time, but they do have a big bomb at the airport to deal with.
(If the guys in-laws were going to get him back for roasting his wife and their relative, wouldn't they have done something bad to him at home?
Why the airport?
And how did these ex-Foreign Legion guys, who sound like native Frenchmen, get into the mix?)
Something's not right--quelle surprise.