This article is from the source 'guardian' and was first published or seen on . It last changed over 40 days ago and won't be checked again for changes.
You can find the current article at its original source at http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/sep/05/annecy-shootings-british-car
The article has changed 9 times. There is an RSS feed of changes available.
| Version 0 | Version 1 |
|---|---|
| Annecy shootings: bodies found in UK-registered car near French lake | Annecy shootings: bodies found in UK-registered car near French lake |
| (about 2 hours later) | |
| Five people including a child were found shot in and around a British-registered car parked in an Alpine beauty spot on Wednesday. Firefighters were alerted by a cyclist – said to be British – who discovered a girl lying seriously injured in front of the vehicle in a secluded car park near the village of Chevaline, close to Lake Annecy. He was in a state of shock afterwards but has since spoken to police officers. | |
| Inside the BMW saloon were the bodies of a man at the wheel and two women in the rear seats. All had been shot. Their ages are not known, but some reports said they were aged in their 40s or 50s. | |
| A second man "dressed in cycling gear" was found "in the proximity of the car", according to gendarmes, who said the ground around the vehicle was littered with bullet cartridges, suggesting all the gunshots had come from outside the car. A bicycle belonging to the man was found nearby. | A second man "dressed in cycling gear" was found "in the proximity of the car", according to gendarmes, who said the ground around the vehicle was littered with bullet cartridges, suggesting all the gunshots had come from outside the car. A bicycle belonging to the man was found nearby. |
| The girl was taken by helicopter to Grenoble hospital where surgeons were fighting to save her life. Annecy prosecutor Eric Maillaud said she is aged between six and seven years old. A source told French journalists that she had been hit by at least three bullets. | |
| No arrests have yet been made. Maillaud said: "We don't know who could have done this. We have no idea." | |
| He added that the victims were "found very shortly after the shootings". | |
| No details of the ages or nationality of the victims were released by the French police. | |
| Maillaud said: "The car is an English car, we are sure of that, but we don't know their nationality." | |
| A British Foreign Office spokesman said: "We are aware of the reports of the shooting and we are looking into these urgently." | |
| The area around the car park was sealed off and 60 gendarmes were searching for evidence. "At this stage of the inquiry we cannot have any idea what happened," said the public prosecutor, Eric Maillaud. | The area around the car park was sealed off and 60 gendarmes were searching for evidence. "At this stage of the inquiry we cannot have any idea what happened," said the public prosecutor, Eric Maillaud. |
| The local Dauphin Libéré newspaper said Chevaline residents had reported seeing a car leaving the village at high speed late on Thursday afternoon. According to Annecy's official website, the area is known as the "little Venice of the Alps" and is a centre for swimming and watersports. | |
| Leila Lamnaouer, a French journalist, told Sky News that it was unclear if the victims were local or tourists. "A lot of people are coming here to spend holidays and use the lake because we have a beautiful landscape," she said. "A lot of English people live here because they love the place." | |