Gilles Bouleau: “There are still those nostalgic for the Solar Temple”

– Gilles Bouleau: “There are still those nostalgic for the Solar Temple”

A young journalist in 1994, the star of TF1’s 8 p.m. news spent more than two years investigating the sect.

BotTalk

How was October 5, 1994 for you?

When we learned of the simultaneous fires in Switzerland with the presence of detonators and explosives, there was chaos at TF1. A series of murders, suicides – it wasn’t very clear – transatlantic and synchronized, it was unheard of. The TF1 editorial team immediately sent journalists to the site. Shortly after, we learned that a somewhat identical operating procedure was noted very far away, in Quebec, in the Laurentians at Morin Heights. I took the first plane.

Had you ever heard of OTS before this?

No, despite the bulletins of associations which fought against sects, never, but I was taken aback. We were dealing with a desire to mass murder more than 50 people on two different continents, three distinct places, with protagonists, killers here who found themselves victims there.

How did you approach this subject?

At first I looked for a logic behind it all, but it eluded me. I spent a lot of time taking it all in, getting to grips with this matter. The names got tangled in my mind: Luc Jouret, Michel Tabachnik, Jo Di Mambro, Joël Egger (editor’s note: the main killer of the OTS, found in Salvan). It took me a while to understand who was who, who did what, who were the victims, the executioners. It took me days and days.

How do we penetrate a world that is by definition secret and closed?

I went into it like a maze and tried to understand. I met survivors, parents. We found capes, swords, everything was crazy! From the beginning, astonishment, which is the source of all journalistic work, guided me. Then came the fascination. Few files, in my life as a reporter, have shocked and amazed me as much as this one.

Do you think about it often?

Yes, very often. Firstly because if I add up all the working hours, I think I must have spent two years of my life reporting, traveling, the two books with Arnaud Bédat and Bernard Nicolas on the OTS.

Is there still a mystery about the OTS or have we understood everything about this affair?

Honestly, I think I have understood almost everything, including the mechanics of power, domination, seduction in all these dimensions. The emotional, financial, geographical and friendly dimensions. I understood almost everything about this micro-society. For what? Because of the 74 victims, I tried to find out everything. Who were they? Were they alcoholics, drug addicts? The answer is always no. They were cultured people, some of them multilingual, integrated into society. That made things even more disturbing. How did absolutely normal people leave their independence, abandon their husband, their wife, have a new companion imposed on them or think of witnessing without bursting out laughing at theogony, the conception without sexual intercourse of a Christ. They attended black masses believing in them or wanting to believe in them. The great scam, which will be fatal, is to have abused this desire for transcendence to make money from it. For me, the greatest mystery is how such a movement could prosper in countries as structured as Switzerland, France and Canada, where it is difficult to hide 50 francs from the tax authorities, without any judge or no police officers were interested in it earlier?

You met many former members of the OTS. What do you remember from it?

First, that this microsociety was made up of clans, of hatreds, and that its members were under the spell of one or more leaders. They had one thing in common: none of them said to me “what a hellish time!” How could I have been so gullible?” Everyone I met, despite the disastrous end of the sect, retains a scent of nostalgia, even today. They praise the parallel universe, working in the fields, organic farming, waking up at 5 a.m. So, despite the absolute horror and the deadly aspect that was written in the genes of the sect from the beginning, since it was based on lies, many have a generally positive reading of it. A newborn baby was killed with a stake through the heart, elderly women were shot in the back, but the judgment of some survivors nevertheless remained balanced. As if the fact that these people were dead, most of them murdered, was not that serious.