Thursday, August 25, around 4:30 p.m., gendarmes intervened at a place called La Forêt Belleville. They accompany a team from the Creuse prefecture for a health inspection at a man’s home. When they arrive, only the companion is present. When the man finally returns home,At the wheel of an Audi A3 registered in Great Britain, the soldiers wanted to check his papers but he drove off, hitting and injuring two gendarmes, one of them seriously. After eight days on the run, he was finally arrested in Belgium.
Established in the region for seven years
The mayor of the town Martine Laporte, interviewed by France Bleu Creuse, describes a “very pleasant man” apparently who has been living in Creuse for seven years with his partner. “The inhabitants of La Forêt quickly understood that there was something wrong” among their neighbours, however, indicates the city councilor. They held, according to her, 26 beagles in cages at their home. Thursday, August 25, the dog breeding of the couple was precisely the subject of a health check.“We have been ringing the alarm bells for two or three years, without much result, until we reach this outcome”she adds, expressing her concern.
Convicted in 2005 in the United Kingdom for fraud
According to investigators, it is Robert Hendy-Freegard, a 51-year-old Briton known to police in Great Britain for major serial fraud. Thanks to his scams, he is said to have embezzled more than a million pounds sterling. In the 90s, “he pretended to be an agent of MI5, the British equivalent of the DGSI in France. He was going to see students, mostly women, telling them that they were threatened by the IRA, the terrorists of the republican army Irish, and that they had to cut themselves off from their whole familytold France 3 Limousin Adam Sage, a Paris correspondent for the “Times”. He was able to have almost total control over their lives.” Sentenced in 2005, he was released in 2009 according to the Timesand settled a few years later in France.
His partner has been wanted by his children for seven years
Also according to the mayor of the town, the suspect’s companion lived as a recluse in the house. The situation of this woman “who has not left her home for seven years”worried the whole town. “When we wanted to talk to her, she held out a phone above the barrier. There was only one number, that of her husband. We can imagine his living conditions, you can imagine the noise and the smell of the dogs”. According to the city councilor, the children of the suspect’s partner managed to find their mother. Her daughter reportedly arrived last February but failed to bring her back to England. His son would have happened to him “Tuesday evening” and would have managed to convince his mother to leave, after having found a solution to take the 26 beagles to Great Britain.
Inside a Netflix documentary
The Brit was the subject of the Netflix documentary The Puppet Master: Handling Lessons, released last January. Directed by Sam Benstead and Gareth Johnson, the three episodes of the series recount the hunt for a “cruel hustler disguised as a British spy”who “manipulates and robs its victims, leaving ruined families in its wake”. Two brother and sister tell, among other things, how their mother was manipulated by Robert Hendy-Freegard (who called himself David), from 2012. The scammer had already been sentenced to life in 2005, for “plethora of offences”reports The Guardian : kidnapping, theft and deception. He was cleared on appeal two years later for the kidnapping and released, according to the British daily. The identity of his companion also coincides with the woman in the documentary.