"There is no evidence against me," the 66-year-old son of a Parsi clothes merchant and Vietnamese mother told IANS. "Had they had a shred of evidence, the Supreme Court would have convicted me years ago."
It is now four years since Sobhraj, presently a respectable French businessman dabbling in films, has been fighting a 20-year jail sentence slapped on him in 2004 by a Kathmandu district court judge, who has now been accused of being biased and sloppy.
Supreme Court judges Ram Prasad Shah and Gauri Dhakal, who last year began hearing Sobhraj's appeal against the life sentence, June 23 wrapped up nearly eight months of arguments by the state as well as Sobhraj's formidable team of lawyers. The judges then announced they would deliver the verdict July 14.
"My case went through the district and the appellate courts and nowhere could police provide any evidence," Sobhraj said. "Incredibly, they never even called a single witness."
The murder case, despite its antiquity, has been one of the most sensational Nepal has ever witnessed.
In December 1975, two badly charred bodies were found in different parts of Kathmandu valley.
The body of the woman, who was first stabbed to death, was identified as that of Connie Jo Bronzich, an American backpacker with an unsavoury reputation of taking drugs and being involved with other addicts.
The second body, that of a male, could not be identified. Police conjectured it could have been that of a Canadian tourist, Laurent Armand Carriere, who had shacked up with Bronzich in Kathmandu.
"The manager of the budget hotel where Bronzich stayed said police suspected Carriere had killed Bronzich and fled," Sobhraj said. "That is also mentioned in the police case file. But after I was arrested in India, someone in Nepal changed his mind and decided to implicate me."
Sobhraj says he never came to Nepal before 2003, when he arrived as a bona fide entrepreneur to explore various ventures, ranging from making documentaries for his Paris-based Gentleman Films company to starting a mineral water business.
On Sep 17, 16 days after his arrival, a local daily carried his photograph, which alerted the police who traced him to a casino and arrested him.
"I saw the photo," Sobhraj scoffed. "If I had been guilty, I would have fled immediately."
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