30 years of the OTS: “I saw all the bodies, we cannot

Continuation of our commemorative series on the 30 years of the Order of the Solar Temple (OTS). On the night of October 5, 1994, the tragedy shook Salvan and Cheiry. Shortly before dawn, 23 bodies were discovered in a burning farm in the village of Cheiry, in the canton of Fribourg. Around the same time, a burning chalet in Salvan left 25 corpses. The investigation quickly turned towards the OTS. An apocalyptic sect, whose members seem to have voluntarily, or not, killed themselves to reach another dimension.

A few days before the tragedy, the former president of Salvan, Pierre-Angel Piasenta, confided his fears to the police about the occupants of the incriminated chalets. The comings and goings of several vehicles registered with rental plates worry the politician. “I asked myself questions, but more in relation to drugs,” recalls Pierre-Angel Piasenta. The police also went to the site. But nothing to report. “There was no one there. The followers of the sect who died were staying elsewhere, in rented apartments in Salvan, Les Granges and Les Marécottes,” explains the ex-president.