Draft:Bruno Sulak
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Bruno Sulak, born November 6, 1955 in Sidi Bel Abbès in Algeria, and died on March 29, 1955 in Paris during an escape attempt, is a famous French robber known for his good manners, his pleasant side and his audacity, his heists without physical violence, he his sometimes compared to the novel character Arsène Lupin.
He is also famous for several prison escapes.
Biography
[edit]His father Stanislas Sulak, born in Toul in 1930 of a father who emigrated from Poland[1], is a former member of the French Foreign Legion, having fought in Indochina where he lost an arm[2]. The family left Algeria in August 1957. He spent his childhood inMarseille.
Commitment to the Legion
[edit]In 1976 at 20, he joined the Legion under the name "Bernard Suchon",[3]. Assigned to the paratroopers at Calvi in Corsica (2nd Foreign Parachute Regiment), he lefts the barracks during a weekend in May 1978, without permission, to see his family, thinking his absence would not be noticed. But the same day the regiment was mobilized and sent to jump to the Battle of Kolwezi, in Zaire. Absent, he will be considered as a deserter. He then goes a few month later, from mid-October[2], start a series of supermarket robberies.
Wedding
[edit]On February 24, 1979, he married, under his real name, with Patricia, pregnant of their first child, Amélie[3].
Robberies, legal proceedings and escape
[edit]On February 28, the gendarmes came to arrest him, not for his series of robberies but for his desertion from the army. While searching his car, the police discovered a large quantity of bank notes and checks in the trunk, as well as weapons used in the hold-ups. He his immediately incarcered[4].
On June 24, 1980, he escape from Albi's prison by sawing the bars of his cell and in August 1980, returned to free another inmate imprisoned in Montpellier, Jean-Louis Segreto[3].
In 1981, he passed his helicopter pilot's licence.[3].
On January 25, 1982, he was arrested avenue de Suffren at Paris. On July 21, 1982, at Montpellier, Bruno Sulak is tried alongside his partner Thalie and Dragan Rančić, for the escape of Jean-Louis Segreto. Sulak and Rančić are sentenced to 3 years in prison. Thalie is sentenced to 18 months in prison.
Shortly after, he tooks advantage of a trip for his hearing in a judge's office , concerning a case of bad checks, to escape. As he his brought back by train from Montpellier to Lyon, under the guard of five gendarmes, two armed complices neultralize them, take their weapons and the three flee to the Valergues-Lansargues station[5]. One of his weapons, a MAC Mle 1950, will later be found with balaclavas, in a stolen BMW in which Marc Mill and Anthony Delon then aged 18 are found.
Sulak will then carry out a series of jewelry store robberies : Van Gold rue de Caumartin at Paris, Cartier at avenue Montaigne, then again Cartier on Promenade de la Croisette at Cannes, where he enters the jewelry store in tennis outfit with a sports bag and a racket[2]. He then operates ith an accopmlice : Novica Zivkovic (1955-1984), alias Radisa « Steve » Jovanović, « Le Yougo ».
Friendship with Steve Jovanović
[edit]A strong friendship will link the two men, to the point that Jovanović will take Sulak as his last name. He will then be better known under the surname of « Steve Sulak ». Former bodyguard of Jean-Paul Belmondo and French boxing champion in the heavyweight category, Steve played the role of a secret agent policeman in the film The Professional (1981). At the time of filming, where we can see him among numerous extras dressed as police officers, in the park of the château de Maintenon, he was wanted by the police. On his wrist, a gold watch, the result of a burglary.
Sulak and Jovanović's method is well-established : without violence, the employees are handcuffed while the criminals take away the jewelry, necklaces, and other bracelets. They took care to take the film from the surveillance camera and fled on foot.
Media interest
[edit]Stunned by the two hold-ups of which his stores have just been victimsn the CEO of Cartier, Alain-Dominique Perrin, declared : « In the public's mind, it is a visual memorization of the Cartier name like no campaign could create.»
Sulak's reputation is made, the media are interested in him. He is sometis nicknamed the « Arsène Lupin of jewelry stores[2] » or « the burglar champion[2] », described as a bandit without blood on his hands, charming and elegant and not afraid of risk[2]. During his runs, he sometimes allows himself to telephone Commissioner Moreas, responsible for his arrest.
Sulak seems to maintain his myth as a gentleman burglar. During a jewelry store robbery, a customer was trying on a ring. Rather than taking it with the rest of the loot, Sulak puts the ring on her finger with a flirtatious smile before leaving. Likewise, meeting a homelessness on the steps of Paris métro, he offers her a bouquet of violets, then gives her 10,000 francs in 500 notes.
To recover the value of the stolen jewelry he made arrangements with the insurance companies (often the Lloyds) by asking them for half of what they should have repaid.
Last heist and last conviction
[edit]For the first and only time, a heist at Thionville goes wrong. Sulak is forced to take a hostage and threaten the police with a grenade. He decides to go green, and leaves for Brazil. But he returns to Europe after just a few months[2]. In february 1984, seeking to return to France, he was arrested at the Spanish border at Hendaye. The car in wich he is traveling has in fact been declared stolen[2]. The police narrowly missed releasing him on bail, not having immediately discovered his false identity[2]. He is incarcerated at Bayonne, then quickly to the prison de Gradignan, near Bordeaux.
His friend Jovanović then plans an escape by helicopter. But the Police de l'air et des frontières is aware of the project. On March 11, 1984, when he went to the rental company to take the flight he had ordered, the Bordeaux SRPJ was waiting for him[6]. Shooting breaks out and Jovanović is shot near the helicopter[2] like the Jean-Paul Belmondo's character in the movie The Professional, in which he played).
On March 18, 1984 at the cour d'assises of Tarn, Bruno Sulak is on a trial for a robbery in 1978 at Albi. On March 21, he was sentenced to 9 years in prison. He is serving his sentence at Fleury-Mérogis prison[2].
Death
[edit]On the night of March 17 to 18, 1985, he tried to escape from Fleury-Mérogis. With the complicity of the assistant director and a supervisor, he manages to leave his cell and reach an administratice building, not far from the exit. But spotted, he tries to escape and jumps of falls i[2] in the parking lot, from a second story window. He is seriously injured. Based of his injuries his family will contest the intentional fall[7].
Driven into a coma at hôpital de la Pitié-Salpêtrière at Paris, he died there on the night of Thursday March 28 to Friday March 29, 1985, at 29.
He is buried in the penitentiary section of thecimetière parisien de Thiais, in the presence of Albert Spaggiari came incognito to pay his last respects, on April 2, 1985. Contrary to a fairly widespread legend, Bruno Sulak was not buried on the sly in an anonymous grave. His name was engraved on the headstone of his grave. At the request of his parents, who lived in the south of France and could not visit his grave, his remains where exhumed and then transferred to the cimetière du Père-Lachaise to be cremated. The archives of the Parisian cemetery of Thiais indicate that the exhumation was carried out in 1997. According to the written testimony of his sister, Pauline Sulak, on the site « Landru, cimetières de France et d'ailleurs » - cremation took place on November 14, 1998. The ashes are given to the family.
Bibliography
[edit]- Pauline Sulak, Bruno Sulak Carrère (1985) ISBN 2-86804-229-5
- Pauline Belmihoub , Bruno Sulak l'ami public numéro 1 Melanges Eds (2007) ISBN 978-2-917-31503-3
- Philippe Jaenada, Sulak Éditions Julliard (2013) ISBN 978-2-260-02059-2
TV documentaries
[edit]Radio broadcasts
[edit]- « Bruno Sulak, le gentleman braqueur » le 12 août 2017 dans Hondelatte raconte de Christophe Hondelatte sur Europe 1.
- « Bruno Sulak, l'héritier d'Arsène Lupin » le 7 janvier 2022 dans L'Heure du crime de Jean-Alphonse Richard sur RTL.
- Fabrice Drouelle (2 janvier 2023). "Bruno Sulak, le braqueur affable" (audio). France Inter, Affaires sensibles. Retrieved 3 janvier 2023.
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Fictions
[edit]- 2024 : Libre de Mélanie Laurent. The role of Bruno Sulak is played by Lucas Bravo.
Notes and references
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- ^ Philippe Jaenada (2013). Sulak. Robert Laffont. p. 57..
- ^ Alain Hamon; Jean-Charles Marchand (1983). Dossier P-- comme police. A. Moreau. p. 16..
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
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