The brother of a British man killed in the French Alps has demanded a new probe into the ‘bungling’ French police.
Zaid Al-Hilli, 65, whose brother Saad, 50, was gunned down alongside his wife, mother-in-law, and a French cyclist in 2012 has now launched a blistering attack on investigators, accusing local police of a ‘diabolical’ cover-up that has hampered one of the most notorious unsolved cases of the century.
Hilli is now calling for an urgent probe into the officers who originally handled the case.
The massacre, which saw Saad, an Iraq-born satellite engineer from Surrey, shot dead at the wheel of his BMW on a remote mountain road near Lake Annecy, sent shockwaves across Europe.
His wife Iqbal, 47, her mother Suhaila, 74, and local cyclist Sylvain Mollier, 45, were all executed in a hail of bullets.
Saad’s eldest daughter Zainab, seven, was left critically injured after being shot in the shoulder and pistol-whipped, while her four-year-old sister Zeena survived by cowering under her mother’s lifeless body for hours.
Now, as a Paris cold case unit reopens the investigation, Zaid has spoken out, accusing the original investigators of gross negligence and even a possible cover-up.
Zaid, who was once himself named as a suspect by French police but later cleared, said: ‘The initial investigation was a complete disaster. Look at the mistakes – were they accidental, or were they part of something bigger? That’s what we need to find out,’ he told The Mirror.
Zaid Al-Hilli, 65, is now calling for an urgent probe into the officers who originally handled the case of his murdered brother


Surrey businessman Saad al-Hilli, 50, (left) his wife Iqbal, 47, and his mother-in-law Suhaila al-Allaf, 74 (right) also died in the September 2012 bloodbath, along with local cyclist Sylvian Mollier, 45

Saad and his wife, along with her mum, were slain in an as-yet unsolved murder in 2012 (pictured, the crime scene)

He slammed the original team for contaminating the crime scene, trampling over crucial evidence, and failing to conduct a reconstruction at the time of the murders.
Instead, a belated reconstruction took place more than a decade later at a disused airfield outside Paris, attended by lawyers and police chiefs.
‘It’s appalling that we’ve had to wait 11 years for them to piece this together,’ he added. ‘What else has been lost or destroyed in that time?,’ he added.
Prosecutors have admitted that a forensics officer accidentally contaminated key evidence with his own DNA, and that the area around the crime scene was inexplicably reopened to the public just 48 hours after the massacre.
The case has been plagued by speculation over possible motives, ranging from Saad’s high-security work in the satellite industry to family disputes over inheritance.
Zaid himself was arrested by UK police in 2013 on suspicion of conspiracy to murder, following reports of a feud between the brothers.
He was released six months later without charge.
Other theories have pointed to Sylvain Mollier as the intended target.
The local father-of-three was reportedly shot first and last, with more bullets than anyone else.
Former Surrey detective Mark Preston, who worked on the case, told a Channel 4 documentary that the Al-Hilli family may have been innocent bystanders caught in the crossfire of a targeted hit on Mollier.

French police inspect a drain under the road to the murder scene at Cheverlaine near Annecy in the Haute-Savoie region of south-eastern France where the victims of a quadruple murder were discovered. Pictured: September 2012

The caravan and tent used by Saad al-Hilli and his family while on holiday at the Le Solitaire du Lac campsite on Lake Annecy (File photo)

Earlier in 2021, detectives (pictured at the scene in September 2021) said they were investigating a possible link between the murders and a bungling gang of contract killers based in Paris
The reopening of the case has brought fresh hope to Zaid and the families of the victims.
The inquiry is now being overseen by the Association for Victims of Unsolved Crimes, a new organisation led by ex-police chief Benoît de Maillard, which is reviewing 391 cold cases across France.
Zaid has also hired renowned French lawyer William Bourdon to push for answers, but has admitted his annoyance at the opportunities that had been missed in the early days of the investigation..
The original investigators’ failure to even locate Zeena for eight hours – despite her being alive and hidden under her mother’s corpse – has been widely criticised as emblematic of the botched handling of the case.
Zaid remains convinced that local authorities deliberately concealed key information.
‘This was a local crime, covered up by local police,’ he claimed.
The devastated brother believes French cops knew more than they were claiming to as they did not want the story to gain traction in the public sphere.
Zaid claims this is the only explanation behind the way the police acted throughout the investigation.
With new investigators untainted by the failures of the past now on the case, Zaid hopes justice may finally be within reach.
‘After all this time, we deserve answers,’ he said. ‘We deserve to know why this happened – and why the police failed us so badly.’
The massacre remains one of France’s most haunting mysteries, and for the Al-Hilli family, an injustice they hope one day will be solved.
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