Editing Order of the Solar Temple (section)

== Mass murders and suicides ==

=== Planning ===
Given the scale of the issues facing the group's leaders, it was decided they would "transit" to [[Sirius]].{{sfn|Michaud|1996|p=35}} The OTS described transit as "in no way a suicide in the human sense of the term".{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=117}} In their view, traitors would be simply murdered, while "weaker" members would be "helped" to transit, and the remaining members considered strong enough would kill themselves. Members believed that, upon death, they would acquire "solar bodies" in a faraway location in space (typically given as the star Sirius, but alternatively [[Jupiter]] or [[Venus]]).{{sfn|Labelle|2006|p=162}}{{sfn|Wessinger|2000|p=219}}{{sfn|Palmer|1996|p=303}} The group's leaders wrote four letters expressing these views, known as ''The Testament'', which contained expressions of the order's beliefs.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=218}}{{sfn|Palmer|1996|p=303}} Patrick Vuarnet was instructed by Di Mambro to mail the Testament letters to several people.{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|1997|p=20}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|1997|p=214}} Shortly before the end of the group, the OTS was renamed Alliance Rosy-Cross ({{langx|fr|Alliance Rose Croix}}, ARC, with the public name Association for Cultural Research) in a final meeting in September 1994,{{sfn|Labelle|2006|p=161}}{{sfn|Bogdan|2006|p=140}} though this may have actually been intended as a new organization.{{sfn|Bogdan|2006|p=140}}

The Testament letters divided the dead into three groups.{{sfn|Palmer|1996|pp=303–304}}

* "Traitors", who were murdered
* "Immortals", who had been "helped" in death (killed) by other members
* "Awakened", who had committed voluntary suicide

=== Morin-Heights, Cheiry and Salvan ===
{{main|1994 Solar Temple massacres}}

On 30 September 1994, the Dutoits were lured to Di Mambro's chalet in [[Morin-Heights]] by Dominique Bellaton.{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|p=212}}{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=229}} Two members, Joël Egger and Jerry Genoud, killed the family, including the three-month-old child, stabbing them repeatedly.{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|1997|p=215}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|p=213}} As ordered by Di Mambro, these murders were carried out in a ritualistic fashion.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=230}} Bellaton and Egger left for Switzerland the same day; the Genouds spent the next four days cleaning the scene and preparing for death.{{sfn|Michaud|1996|p=30}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|1997|p=217}} On 4 October they set incendiary timers to go off and burn the house down, dying as a result.{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=145}}

During the night from 2 to 3 October 1994, 23 died in Cheiry.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=230}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|p=214}} Twenty of the dead had been shot with one gun;{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=115}} 21 of them had died from gunshot wounds after being drugged with sleeping pills, with another two suffocated in plastic bags.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=231}}{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=146}} Egger and Jouret are known killers in this event, though it is possible they were not the only ones.{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|p=214}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|1997|p=220}} In Salvan, the dead had been injected with poison; according to the investigative report, it is likely that the fatal injections at Salvan were done by Line Lheureux, with Annie Egger doing the same to the children.{{sfn|Michaud|1996|p=10}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|1997|pp=223–224}} On the morning of 5 October, the Testament letters were mailed out.{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|1997|p=20}}

On 4 October 1994, the bodies of the Genouds were found in the burned-out chalet; the next day the bodies of the Dutoits were found in the building's cellar.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=229}} On 5 October, Swiss [[examining magistrate]] André Piller was called by the police to a fire in Cheiry, where bodies had been discovered.{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=115}} Soon after this they heard news of the fire in Granges-sur-Salvan; when the fire died down, bodies were discovered.{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=115}} These two fires were connected when Egger's car, who lived in the Cheiry house, was found parked outside the Salvan commune; the next day, the Canadian police realized that there was likely a connection between the Morin-Heights fire and the Swiss fires as the properties were owned by the same men.{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=116}}

The leadership of the OTS cared deeply about the group's legacy, and spent a large amount of time preemptively creating a "legend" through both the manifestos they mailed to various media and scholarly sources, and by destroying all evidence that would have conflicted with their own story. This plan was disrupted, as some of the incendiary devices had failed. This left behind a large number of the Temple's written documents, some of which were found on the group's surviving computers, as well as audio and video cassettes.{{sfn|Mayer|1999|pages=172–174}}

According to Thierry Huguenin, Jouret and Di Mambro had planned for there to be exactly 54 dead, in connection with 54 Templars who had been burned at the stake in the fourteenth century. This was to allow an immediate magic contact with these departed Templars.{{sfn|Introvigne|2006|p=36}} However, Huguenin, having sensed danger, escaped at the last minute, leaving the death toll at only 53.{{sfn|Lewis|2006|p=3}} After the event, some other members declared their continued support for the group's ideas, and even regretted not having been chosen for transit.{{sfn|Morath|Lemasson|2023c|loc=12:20–13:00}} A Swiss magistrate concluded that of the 52 deaths, only fifteen could be confirmed as suicides.{{sfn|Wessinger|2000|p=219}}

=== Vercors ===
{{main|1995 Vercors massacre}}

On the morning of 16 December 1995, 14 members of the OTS, including three children, were immolated in a circular star-formation in an isolated [[Glade (geography)|clearing]] on the [[Vercors massif]], near [[Saint-Pierre-de-Chérennes]] in [[France]]. Two other bodies were found near them.{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=148}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|p=236}} The investigation conducted by the [[Grenoble]] Gendarmerie hypothesized that the 14 people, including three children, took sedative pills; then Jean-Pierre Lardanchet and André Friedli shot each member in the head one by one with two [[.22 Long Rifle|.22 caliber]] rifles. After that, they poured [[gasoline]] on the bodies and set them on fire, before they both shot themselves in the head with two [[.357 Magnum]] revolvers.{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|pp=232–234}} The bodies of the two perpetrators were found alongside the burned ones.{{sfn|Hall|Schuyler|2000|p=148}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|p=236}} On 23 December 1995, the 16 bodies were discovered after a missing persons investigation by the gendarmerie, after having been led to the bodies by a hunter.{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|pp=234–235}}

The plot had been orchestrated by Christiane Bonet, a devoted former member of the OTS who said she could commune with Jouret and Di Mambro from the afterlife.{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|pp=218–222}} Some of those who died left behind notes where they discussed that they would "see another world".{{sfn|Wessinger|2000|p=219}} Investigators concluded that of the 16 dead, at least four had not died willingly.{{sfn|Lewis|2004|pages=296–297}}

=== Saint-Casimir ===
{{main|1997 Saint-Casimir mass suicide}}

On 22 March 1997, five members of the Solar Temple died in a mass suicide in [[Saint-Casimir, Quebec]], burning their house down with them inside.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=217}} The dead included two couples: Chantal and Didier Quèze, as well as Pauline Riou and Bruno Klaus (Rose-Marie Klaus's ex-husband), and one of their parents.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|pp=233–234}} Responding officers found three teenage survivors at the scene, the children of the Quèzes, who were found to be drugged.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=218}} Following the first failed attempt to initiate the mass suicide (that included them against their will), the children had negotiated their right to live with their parents, who eventually agreed that they did not have to die. Following this, the adults continually failed to burn the house down, becoming increasingly sick, until eventually the teenagers burned the house down at their parents' request.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=237}}

The children were ultimately not charged with any crime, as the fact that they had been drugged and the influence the cult could have had on them was viewed as mitigating their responsibility.{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=234}}{{sfn|Bédat|Bouleau|Nicolas|2000|p=299}} The adults had mailed a transit letter to several Canadian news outlets, in which they explained that they had taken their own lives believing that their deaths would let them "transit" to another planet to continue living.{{sfn|Lewis|2004|pages=296–297}}{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|pp=235–236}}

=== Legal proceedings ===
[[File:Grenoble - Ancien musée-bibliothèque - 2017-09-29.jpg|thumb|Grenoble's former museum-library, the location of the 2001 trial]]
{{Main|Trial of Michel Tabachnik}}

On 23 December 1995, during the ''[[journal de 13 heures]]'' program on the French channel [[TF1]], journalist [[Gilles Bouleau]] claimed that the group had survived and united behind [[Michel Tabachnik]], indirectly declaring that Tabachnik was the mastermind behind the Vercors incident.{{sfn|Morath|Lemasson|2023c|loc=23:15–25:10}} Tabachnik was investigated following the incident; Fontaine placed him under examination on 12 June 1996 for [[conspiracy]].{{sfn|Clusel|Palmer|2020|p=233}} At the time of the investigation, due to the death of the two leaders in Salvan in 1994, Tabachnik was the only defendant in the case. The examining magistrate considered that Tabachnik, through his writings and his conferences, could have incited followers to commit suicide. He was therefore charged with participation in a criminal conspiracy.{{sfn|Morath|Lemasson|2023c|loc=42:40–43:08}}

On 13 April 2001, at the [[Grenoble]] Museum-Library, which had been transformed for the occasion, the court trial of Michel Tabachnik for "criminal conspiracy" began. The plaintiffs' side split into two camps; one camp, led by Alain Vuarnet, felt that the trial should not focus on Tabachnik's responsibility but on the investigation itself, which they felt had not been thorough. Another, led by the anti-cult group [[UNADFI]], believed that Tabachnik and his writings were the cause of the mass suicides, and that cults must be eradicated.{{sfn|Morath|Lemasson|2023d|loc=7:50–8:27}}{{sfn|Mayer|2014|p=49}} On 25 June 2001, the court acquitted Tabachnik, on the basis that there had been no conclusive proof found of any involvement, and his writings accused of influencing the members into death were deemed unlikely to have influenced them.{{sfn|Mayer|2014|p=49}} The [[Ministère public (France)|public prosecutor]] appealed the criminal court's decision, and Tabachnik was tried again in a second trial beginning 24 October 2006.{{sfn|Morath|Lemasson|2023d|loc=39:26–40:20}} The appeals court upheld the lower court's ruling, and he was acquitted a second time in December 2006.{{sfn|Morath|Lemasson|2023d|loc=40:45–41:00}}{{sfn|Mayer|2014|p=49}}