- Bill
shag carpet bomb wrote:
> speaking of culture:
>
> France's love of rogues and rule breakers
>
> Last Thursday morning, I switched on my radio to hear the news as usual
> and was startled by the high-pitched voice of a reporter who, breathless
> with excitement, was telling France that a security van driver who had
> just collected more than 11 million euros from the Bank of France had
> disappeared with the loot.
>
> It transpired that 39-year-old Tony Musulin, who was described by
> friends as being a little odd, had been planning his heist for some time.
>
> Before he absconded, added the radio reporter - unable to hide the note
> of admiration in his voice - Musulin had carefully cleared his bank
> accounts and apartment.
>
> The report ended by triumphantly informing the listener that French
> police did not have a clue as to where the fugitive was now.
>
> In fact Tony Musulin has become an overnight internet star here. He now
> has a fan club on Facebook, which describes him as a hero who has
> carried out the model non-violent crime of the century.
>
> My personal favourite entry on the site reads simply "Tony - Best Driver
> 2009".
>
> 'Charming' gangsters
>
> The fact is the French love rogues and rule breakers.
>
> Many people here subscribe to a code of life known as Systeme D - a sort
> of living by your wits that ever so slightly bends the rules of the
> established system.
>
> French films regularly - one might say obsessively - celebrate the
> criminal culture. French gangsters are almost always charming, capital
> sort of chaps who are a lot smarter than the dimwit cops out to get them.
>
> No point in moralising, everyone knows here that laws are made to be
> transgressed - as long as you do it with style of course.
>
> In September, a man accused of the brutal murder of two women escaped
> from a jail in Burgundy.
>
> Not fascinating in itself but Jean-Pierre Treiber - who has always
> protested his innocence - hid inside a cardboard box in the prison
> workshop and had himself "delivered" to the outside world as part of a
> consignment of stationery.
>
> On the run ever since, Mr Treiber has managed to outwit police at every
> turn, sending letters to his girlfriend and even posting his prison
> identity card to a French magazine.
>
> Suckers for romance (even though the balding, jug-eared ex-forester is
> not exactly a looker), the French are cheering him on.
>
> The government has complained that the media's interest has turned him
> into a hero and has hampered the police's efforts to recover him.
>
> Film makers meanwhile are already penning the scripts.
>
> Captured on film
>
> Treiber's story reminds me of another great name in French criminal
> history, the bank robber Michel Vaujour whom I happened to meet in the
> cinema a few months ago.
>
> Mr Vaujour, who spent 27 years inside, was of course at the picture
> house to promote his new film, which might be best translated into
> English as "Don't bother freeing me, I'm on the case me-self".
>
> The film, which is a fascinating psychological account of how the
> ex-bank robber coped in jail, is also a celebration of his fortitude at
> jail breaking.
>
> His most dramatic escape was in 1986 when he fashioned a replica gun
> from a bar of soap and barged his way on to the prison roof where his
> obliging wife (having cleverly learned to fly a helicopter in her spare
> time) hovered above the prison and scooped him up and away to freedom.
>
> Naturally that specific episode is a film in its own right. After the
> screening, Michel Vaujour kindly took questions from the audience.
>
> I wanted to ask him whether he regretted his criminal ways but question
> time was dominated by a host of well educated, well dressed, Parisian
> women who were tearfully thanking him for his honesty, his humility and
> his humanity.
>
> Good to be 'bad'
>
> The other day, President Sarkozy hit an all-time low in the opinion polls.
>
> When he was elected in 2007, he promised he would base his presidency on
> transparency and in the summer, when the Elysee accountants mistakenly
> placed some of his private expenses in the column marked "state
> accounts", the French leader was quick to pay back every last penny of
> the money that had gone missing.
>
> The president's poor ratings came in the same week that Jacques Chirac,
> his predecessor, was ordered by French magistrates to stand trial on
> embezzlement charges.
>
> In the latest popularity survey, Jacques Chirac was voted the most
> popular French politician alive today.
>
> Poor squeaky-clean Mr Sarkozy does not stand a chance - unless of course
> he and Carla get themselves a pistol each and set themselves up as the
> French Bonnie and Clyde.
>
> No pressure but the French leader needs to get bad fast if he is to win
> another election.
>
> I notice a new entry has recently appeared on Facebook saying simply
> "Tony Musulin for president".
> http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/8359124.stm
>
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