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Monaco millionairess’s son-in-law charged with hiring hitmen to kill her

The son-in-law of a Monaco millionairess has been charged with hiring hitmen to murder her. Poland fired Wojciech Janowski as its honorary consul to the Mediterranean principality when the news broke.

Wojciech Janowski being arrested on 27 June
Wojciech Janowski being arrested on 27 June Reuters/Jean-Paul Pelissier
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Janowski, 64, is accused of hiring two men from the mean streets of Marseille to shoot 77-year-old Hélène Pastor as she left a hospital in the southern French city of Nice, killing her and her chauffeur, Mohammed Darwich.

Having found them through the offices of his personal trainer, he paid 200,000 euros cash and 50,000-euros-worth of gifts for the contract killing in order to “lay his hands on the inheritance” of his partner Sylvia Pastor, Hélène Pastor’s oldest daughter, according to French prosecutor Brice Robin.

Sylvia Pastor, who was detained along with 22 other people on Monday but later released, felt “betrayed” and was “in a very difficult psychological state", Robin told a press conference on Friday.

Poland on Friday announced that it had stripped Janowski of the title of honorary consult "because of the loss of the irreproachable reputation that is essential for this role".

A total of seven people have been charged in connection with the murder and six of them are still in custody.

The two killers - a 31-year-old and a 24-year-old originally from the Comoros islands and living in Marseille's rough northern districts - had been identified as being "present at the location of the killing".

They were found thanks to CCTV footage, mobile phone records and traces of DNA in a Nice hotel where they stayed on the day of the killing.

The 24-year-old shot Pastor with a sawn-off shotgun, while the older man kept watch, Robin said.

Janowski’s trainer, Pascal Dauriac, who had no criminal record, is believed to have found the killers, keeping 50,000 euros for himself and paying them 200,000 euros.

Janowski, who heads a Monaco nanotechnology form and an oil business, had spent 8.4 million euros in less than a year, Robin said.

He reportedly withdrew 250,000 euros from an offshore account in Dubai in nine transactions between 22 April and 4 May, the last just two days before the killing.

Hélène Pastor inherited a real estate and building business set up by her Italian grandfather Jean-Baptiste Pastor and developed by her father, Gildo, after Prince Rainier gave him permission to develop high-rise buildings along the seafront of the tax haven and super-rich playground.
 

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