# A true crime show solved this man’s murder - MrBallen

An episode of [Crime and Horror](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/6813298400), 29 Sep 2026, 29 min.

Audio: https://dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/api.spreaker.com/download/episode/74775977/utf_8_q_a_true_crime_show_solved_this_ma_utf_8_q_n_e2_80_99s_murder_mrballen_64k_5f2_mp3.mp3

A true crime show solved this man’s murder - MrBallen

## Transcript

[0:00] Speaker 1: One night in March of 2016, two friends sat on
[0:03] Speaker 1: a couch in Lunel, France, watching a true crime show
[0:06] Speaker 1: on TV. And the episode really hit close to home, literally,
[0:10] Speaker 1: because it was about a missing person who had vanished
[0:12] Speaker 1: just miles away from where they lived.
[0:14] Speaker 2: And so they're watching the show.
[0:16] Speaker 1: And then all of a sudden, in the middle of it,
[0:19] Speaker 1: one of the friends suddenly stood up and began pacing
[0:21] Speaker 1: around the room, muttering to themselves. And when the other friend,
[0:25] Speaker 1: who was still sitting on the couch watching this, asked
[0:28] Speaker 1: them what was wrong, they were not ready for the answer.
[0:32] Speaker 1: But before we get into today's story, if you're a
[0:35] Speaker 1: fan of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious delivered in story format,
[0:38] Speaker 1: then you've come to the right place because that's all
[0:40] Speaker 1: we do, and we upload two, three, even four times
[0:43] Speaker 1: every week. So, if that's of interest to you, please
[0:46] Speaker 1: offer the like button a really nice, really expensive steak dinner.
[0:51] Speaker 1: But make sure you first significantly dull their steak knife. Also,
[0:55] Speaker 1: please subscribe to our channel and turn on all notifications...
[0:59] 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,
[1:27] Speaker 1: 49-year-old Patrik Iswar hurried out the side door of a
[1:30] Speaker 1: hospital in Sète, France, buttoning a fresh-collared shirt as he
[1:34] Speaker 1: ran to the parking lot. He climbed onto a scooter
[1:37] Speaker 1: and then quickly checked his watch, and then he lifted
[1:39] Speaker 1: the kickstand and sped off into traffic, ignoring honks from
[1:43] Speaker 1: all the other drivers as he swerved between the cars.
[1:46] Speaker 1: Patrik did not care who he was annoying right now,
[1:49] Speaker 1: because he was running late for a date, and then
[1:51] Speaker 1: right after the date, he had to rush over to
[1:53] Speaker 1: his daughter's dance recital. And he desperately wanted to make
[1:56] Speaker 1: sure he made both of these events, because they were
[1:59] Speaker 1: some of the only things he'd had to look forward
[2:00] Speaker 1: to in ages. So things in Patrick's life had not
[2:04] Speaker 1: been good for a really long time. Eight years earlier,
[2:07] Speaker 1: he had slipped into a rut of serious binge drinking
[2:11] Speaker 1: and gambling. And one day when he was drunk, he
[2:14] Speaker 1: had actually struck his wife. Following that, his wife had
[2:17] Speaker 1: divorced him, and he'd lost custody of his daughter, Alabama,
[2:21] Speaker 1: who was now 12 years old.
[2:23] Speaker 2: After that, Patrick's life really did not get any better.
[2:26] Speaker 1: He had moved in with his elderly mother, and his
[2:28] Speaker 1: drinking had only gotten worse, and his gambling continued to
[2:31] Speaker 1: the point where he basically gambled away most of what
[2:33] Speaker 1: he made by working as a hospital janitor. And then
[2:36] Speaker 1: after that, he'd gotten involved with a married co-worker, and
[2:40] Speaker 1: then when her husband found out about this affair, she
[2:43] Speaker 1: died of an apparent suicide. Her death had been five
[2:47] 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
[2:53] Speaker 1: to a life of bachelorhood when, actually a few weeks earlier,
[2:57] Speaker 1: he had gotten a call from the woman he was
[2:58] Speaker 1: now going to meet, Audrey LeVay. But Patryk was now
[3:01] Speaker 1: running so late for his date that he worried Audrey
[3:04] Speaker 1: might not wait around for him. So he twisted the
[3:07] Speaker 1: throttle of his scooter and shot across an intersection, ignoring
[3:11] Speaker 1: more honks from more cars. Patryk had actually met Audrey
[3:14] Speaker 1: a long time ago, right after his divorce, and they'd
[3:17] Speaker 1: gone out a handful of times before they ultimately lost touch.
[3:20] Speaker 1: She was a lot younger than he was, and she'd
[3:22] Speaker 1: stood him up more than once in the past. But
[3:24] Speaker 1: she was also a lot of fun, and it had
[3:26] Speaker 1: been a while since Patryk had been on a date,
[3:28] Speaker 1: so when she called him up saying she wanted to
[3:30] Speaker 1: go out again, Patryk had said, sure. They'd made plans
[3:33] Speaker 1: to meet this afternoon at a park near Patryk's work
[3:36] Speaker 1: that had this big rocky hill rising behind it, and
[3:39] Speaker 1: the place had some of the best views in the
[3:41] Speaker 1: whole city, with the.
[3:42] Speaker 2: Ocean on one side.
[3:44] Speaker 1: and dramatic cliffs dotted with all these old caves on
[3:47] Speaker 1: the other. Now, they were not going to have a
[3:48] Speaker 1: whole lot of time together, probably just enough for a
[3:51] Speaker 1: short walk before Patrik would have to rush off for
[3:54] Speaker 1: his daughter's dance recital later that night. But he hoped
[3:57] Speaker 1: that the romantic setting might help spark something between them again.
[4:02] Speaker 1: A few minutes later, Patrik pulled up to the park entrance,
[4:05] Speaker 1: and to his relief, Audrey was still there waiting for him.
[4:08] Speaker 2: So he parked his scooter.
[4:09] Speaker 1: And locked his cell phone in the scooter's underseat compartment,
[4:12] Speaker 1: and he walked over to her.
[4:13] Speaker 2: And from her nervous smile, he.
[4:15] Speaker 1: Got the sense that she was almost as excited about
[4:18] Speaker 1: the date as he was, which gave him a nice
[4:20] Speaker 1: boost of confidence. So he took her hand and they
[4:23] Speaker 1: started down the path. Around 8 a.m. the next morning,
[4:31] Speaker 1: 10 miles up the coastline from where Patrik and Audrey
[4:34] Speaker 1: had been walking at that park, Patrik's older brother, Mark Iswar,
[4:38] Speaker 1: stood on the deck of his boat, pulling a big
[4:40] Speaker 1: oyster trap out of the water. As he was doing this,
[4:43] Speaker 1: his phone rang, so he stopped and he answered it.
[4:46] Speaker 1: But before he could even say hello, his mother's very
[4:48] Speaker 1: worried voice came across the line, asking if he knew.
[4:51] Speaker 2: Where Patrik was.
[4:53] Speaker 1: Mark frowned, because Patrik lived with their mother, so she
[4:56] Speaker 1: should know better than he would. But his mother explained
[4:59] Speaker 1: that Patrik hadn't come home last night. He also wasn't
[5:02] Speaker 1: answering his phone, he hadn't shown up to work that morning,
[5:05] Speaker 1: and perhaps most concerning of all, he'd missed his daughter's
[5:08] Speaker 1: dance recital the previous evening. And it was this last
[5:11] Speaker 1: fact that made Mark think that something might actually be
[5:13] Speaker 1: wrong here, because he knew how much Patrick loved his
[5:16] Speaker 1: daughter and how.
[5:17] Speaker 2: Much he was looking forward to that recital.
[5:19] Speaker 1: So he promised his mother he would get to the
[5:20] Speaker 1: bottom of it. Then he hung up and began calling
[5:23] Speaker 1: Patrick's friends. However, with each conversation he had, Mark got
[5:27] Speaker 1: more worried because nobody had heard from Patrick since yesterday afternoon.
[5:32] Speaker 1: He'd apparently left work around 4 p.m., but he hadn't
[5:34] Speaker 1: told anybody where he was going. Now, for Mark, he
[5:37] Speaker 1: felt like this was at least somewhere to start.
[5:39] Speaker 2: Patryk's work.
[5:41] Speaker 1: So he steered his boat to the dock, tied it off,
[5:43] Speaker 1: and then jumped in his car and started heading that direction.
[5:49] Speaker 1: Four hours later, Mark stood on a rocky lookout point
[5:52] Speaker 1: scanning the city below. Patryk's hospital stood in the middle
[5:55] Speaker 1: of Set's business district, which was packed.
[5:57] Speaker 2: With canals and cafes and tourist spots.
[6:00] Speaker 1: And Mark and a handful of Patryk's friends had spent
[6:03] Speaker 1: all morning checking them one by one, looking for Patryk.
[6:07] Speaker 2: But they hadn't found him or any sign of him.
[6:09] Speaker 1: And so now Mark had turned his focus to some
[6:12] Speaker 1: of the more remote areas around the city, like the
[6:14] Speaker 1: hill behind the park where he now stood.
[6:17] Speaker 2: But there was still no sign of Patryk anywhere. And
[6:19] Speaker 2: so Mark was trying to think of anywhere else his
[6:22] Speaker 2: brother might have gone when his phone rang.
[6:24] Speaker 1: It was one of Patryk's friends from the search party,
[6:27] Speaker 1: and he'd just found Patryk's scooter outside the park at
[6:30] Speaker 1: the bottom of the hill, just a short drive from
[6:32] Speaker 1: where Mark was. And so Mark told him not to
[6:34] Speaker 1: touch anything, and he sprinted back to his car, and
[6:37] Speaker 1: he sped down the hill, and he left the park...
[6:40] Speaker 1: And he stopped in the parking lot right outside. And
[6:43] Speaker 1: sure enough, there in the lot was Patrik's scooter. And
[6:46] Speaker 1: as Mark looked at the scooter and at the quiet
[6:48] Speaker 1: park all around him, he felt a cold weight settle
[6:51] Speaker 1: in his stomach. Because he really couldn't think of any
[6:54] Speaker 1: reason why Patrik would leave his scooter here overnight. In
[6:57] Speaker 1: the back of his mind all day, Mark had been
[7:00] Speaker 1: worried that something bad could have happened to his little brother.
[7:03] Speaker 1: But now, after seeing the scooter, he felt sure of it.
[7:11] Speaker 1: Almost two weeks later, at 8 a.m. on July 5, 2014,
[7:15] Speaker 1: Detective Boris Verriere took the exit ramp toward the French
[7:18] Speaker 1: town of Sète. And as the sunlight hit his windshield,
[7:21] Speaker 1: he had to squint as he looked out at the
[7:23] Speaker 1: long stretch of beaches and canals framed by these beautiful
[7:27] Speaker 1: rocky cliffs in a small, dense urban center. Verriere was
[7:31] Speaker 1: a senior investigator from the nearby city of Montpellier, but
[7:35] Speaker 1: he had just been called in to take over a
[7:37] Speaker 1: missing persons case that had stumped the local police in Sète.
[7:40] Speaker 1: About two weeks earlier, 49-year-old Patrik Iswar had disappeared after
[7:45] Speaker 1: going on a date with a woman whose name was
[7:47] Speaker 1: Audrey Louvet. The local police had already spoken to Audrey,
[7:51] Speaker 1: who said she didn't know what had happened to Patrik.
[7:53] Speaker 2: She said they had gone for a walk, and then
[7:55] Speaker 2: he had escorted her to her.
[7:56] Speaker 1: Bus, and then after that, she'd assumed that Patrik just
[7:59] Speaker 1: sort of went back to his scooter and carried on
[8:01] Speaker 1: with his night. But the scooter had been found the
[8:03] Speaker 1: next day, still parked, where he and Audrey had met
[8:06] 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
[8:12] Speaker 1: turned up. Since then, Patryk's brother, Mark, had been helping
[8:15] Speaker 1: the investigation. Verrier had spoken to Mark on the phone,
[8:19] Speaker 1: and Mark had talked about Patryk like he was a saint,
[8:21] Speaker 1: a guy who would drop everything to help out somebody
[8:23] Speaker 1: in a jam, who never got into fights and had
[8:25] Speaker 1: really no enemies. But Verrier didn't necessarily believe this, because
[8:30] Speaker 1: in his experience, people who inexplicably vanished oftentimes were kidnapped
[8:35] Speaker 1: or murdered. Now, he had no reason to actually suspect
[8:38] Speaker 1: that around Patrick. You know, he could have just as
[8:40] Speaker 1: easily gotten into an accident, you know, fallen off a cliff,
[8:43] Speaker 1: or maybe he chose to vanish. But at this point,
[8:47] Speaker 1: what Verrier really needed to do was, on his own,
[8:50] Speaker 1: dig into who Patrick was and figure out if there
[8:53] Speaker 1: was a reason why he wasn't here right now.
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[9:24] Speaker 2: It's the perfect.
[9:25] Speaker 1: Balance of chewy and creamy and fruity and cozy. But
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[9:51] Speaker 1: Look for the purple box of My Mochi ice cream
[9:53] 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
[10:11] Speaker 1: where she was on the day Patrick went missing. Claude
[10:13] Speaker 1: said it was just an ordinary Monday for her, and
[10:16] Speaker 1: that after work, she had picked up their daughter, Alabama,
[10:19] 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
[10:25] 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.
[10:32] 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
[10:50] 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,
[11:03] Speaker 1: Verriere pressed her for more details, but Claude just insisted
[11:07] Speaker 1: that Patrique had really always kept that part of his
[11:09] Speaker 1: life away from her. But after she thought about it
[11:11] Speaker 1: for a moment, She said there was someone who might
[11:14] Speaker 1: be able to tell Verriere more. And then she called
[11:17] Speaker 1: their 12-year-old daughter, Alabama, into the room. Alabama appeared very
[11:21] Speaker 1: visibly nervous and shaken up by everything going on with
[11:23] Speaker 1: her dad. But her mother, Claude, took her hand and
[11:27] Speaker 1: encouraged her to share her story.
[11:29] Speaker 2: And slowly, the girl began to speak.
[11:31] Speaker 1: She said that about a week before her dad disappeared,
[11:34] Speaker 1: he'd brought her along on a very strange errand. They'd
[11:37] Speaker 1: parked outside of a tunnel, and he'd told her to
[11:40] Speaker 1: wait in the car. And then he got out and
[11:42] Speaker 1: walked into this tunnel to meet with someone.
[11:45] Speaker 2: It was a man.
[11:46] Speaker 1: But it was too dark in the tunnel for Alabama
[11:48] Speaker 1: to make out the man's features. But she definitely saw
[11:51] Speaker 1: her father, Patrick, hand this man some kind of package
[11:55] Speaker 1: before he quickly.
[11:56] Speaker 2: Turned and ran back to the car. And then afterwards,
[11:58] 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
[12:04] Speaker 2: of it, he now owed some people a lot of money.
[12:07] Speaker 1: After Alabama finished talking, her mother, Claude, thanked her and
[12:10] Speaker 1: sent her back out of the room. And then once
[12:12] Speaker 1: she was gone, Verriere asked Claude if she knew who
[12:15] Speaker 1: this man in the tunnel might be.
[12:16] Speaker 2: But Claude said she had no idea.
[12:18] 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
[12:39] Speaker 1: SET police station, scrolling through.
[12:41] Speaker 2: A file on his laptop.
[12:42] Speaker 1: Based on Claude's tip, he'd looked up the hairstylist's name
[12:45] Speaker 1: in the police database and had immediately found a connection
[12:48] Speaker 1: to Patryk. Back in 2009, so a few years after
[12:52] 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,
[12:59] 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
[13:05] 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.
[13:15] 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
[13:21] 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
[13:27] Speaker 1: contact information.
[13:29] Speaker 2: At around 10 a.m.
[13:30] Speaker 1: The next day, so July 7th, Verriere followed Remy Chen
[13:34] Speaker 1: into an interrogation room at the SEP police station and
[13:37] Speaker 1: shut the door behind them. Remy was a short, wiry
[13:40] 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
[13:50] Speaker 1: crack under intense pressure. So, right away, he tried to
[13:54] 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,
[14:00] Speaker 1: because Verriere did not actually have any evidence, but he
[14:03] Speaker 1: wanted to see how Remy would react. And to his surprise,
[14:07] Speaker 1: and irritation, Remy just laughed. Remy acted like he literally
[14:11] 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
[14:17] Speaker 1: insinuated that obviously Patrique had had an affair and was
[14:21] 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.
[14:30] 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.
[14:42] Speaker 1: It seemed like Remy was really confident, almost too confident.
[14:47] 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.
[16:08] 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
[16:29] 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,
[16:46] 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
[17:07] 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.

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