On August 9th, 1965, Women’s Rights activist and Assassin Mentor Isabelle Allard was shot and wounded at close range by Henri Alhegeri in Paris, France after giving a speech about the ongoing state of the Vietnam War. It was initially perceived that Alhegeri acted alone, but it was believed that it was a hit on Isabelle called by former compatriot Martina Laurent on behalf of Abstergo Industries, with help from the CIA, who saw Isabelle as a threat.
Allard was seriously wounded by two bullets on her left side, one into her gut on the left side and another on her left shoulder, causing severe blood loss from both wounds and internal bleeding and a punctured lung from the bullet in her gut. She was immediately rushed to the hospital where EMTs managed to stabilize her on the way there, and resuscitate her after she briefly died in the ambulance. Isabelle was operated on to remove the bullets, stop the internal bleeding, reinflate her lung, and fix her collarbone. She lost all function in her left arm for several months due to severe radial neuropathy.
Alhegeri escaped police custody after his initial apprehension and fled to Qatar with the help of Martina Laurent. He was eventually arrested in Doha and extradited back to France, where he pled guilty to attempted assassination and homicide and was sentenced to 35 years in a high-security prison. He passed away from b-cell lymphoma in 1995 at the age of 58 while serving his sentence. Martina was arrested a few months later and sentenced to seven years in prison for bribery and plotting an assassination but was let out after two years on good behavior, which has led to some suspicions on how she was released.
Alhegeri's Background and Motivation[]
Henri Alhegeri was born on March 9th, 1937 to Roberto and Helen Alhegeri, in Verona, Italy. As the only child born to the couple, Henri was a very lonely child and had very few friends. When he was eighteen, he joined a conservative club led by his father and developed a strong disdain for left-wing politics and women's rights. Over in France, he caught wind of a woman named Isabelle Allard, who was campaigning fiercely for women's rights. He moved to France in July of 1963 and began acquiring as much information on Isabelle as possible.
He originally planned to assassinate Isabelle on his own, planning to do so on the date of Isabelle’s famed women’s rights protest in April of 1964, but couldn't get into the heart of Paris, so he put his plans on hold until a better time arose. He couldn’t stand all the fame and power Isabelle was getting due to her fierce advocacy for women’s rights, and he thought the world would be better off without her as she was a threat to conservatism. He contemplated returning to Milan, but chose to stay in Paris, where he would become an interviewer for Channel Nine News and interview Isabelle out at her cabin by way of split screen, where he openly mocked Isabelle's protest by way of snickering after an answer, feeling Isabelle's wrath through her words, fueling his hatred for her even more. He left for Strasbourg to plot his next move. On August 1st, 1965, he was approached by a woman who strongly disdained Isabelle. She introduced herself as Martina Laurent and sat down in his living room. Also present was a CIA agent She informed him that Isabelle was going to speak at an anti-war rally in Paris on August 9th and that she wished for him to kill her, going as far as to show him the Colt 45 pistol in the briefcase and $50,000 USD ($473,034.92 in current US Dollars) as a reward for killing her. The CIA agent stated that the CIA was getting weary of Isabelle's revolutionary behavior, stating it shared stark similarities to socialist countries around Europe and Asia and that she was just using women's rights as a cover for her ideological beliefs. He also added that they tried to assassinate her once before with ricin and botulism toxin and failed, and were looking for someone to kill her so they could remove an 'enemy of the country', but also study her body and genetic makeup along with Abstergo Industries. Without hesitation, Henri agreed, and the two of them traveled to Paris whereas the agent returned to Langley, Virginia.
Both versions of Isabelle's famed Modern Revolutionary portrait. Henri was disgusted by these portraits because Isabelle looked 'like a dictator' and because he believed that women should never reveal skin in public. They both played a role in Henri being the one to kill Isabelle.
A day later, he watched Isabelle give a speech about how she was not afraid and that the women's rights revolution would continue. This speech along with two portraits of Isabelle that were unveiled convinced Henri that Isabelle was a corrupt and immoral woman who imposed her will like a dictator. For those reasons, and with Martina's backing, he was going to be the one to end Isabelle's life.
Assassination Attempt[]
- "Have I had just a bit more time and my aim be more true, the third bullet would have hit her square in the forehead, putting her in the ground for good."
- ―An Excerpt from the Journal of Henri Alhegeri, July 9th, 1975.
On the day of August 9th, 1965, Isabelle Allard took to the stage at 1 pm. Of the day she recalled:
- "It was nice and sunny out, and the park was packed for my speech that afternoon. During my time up on the stage, I’ll be honest and say that the thought did cross my mind that there could have been someone in the crowd waiting to pick me off. But I ignored it and carried on with my speech."
- ―Isabelle recalling her speech on August 9th, 1965
Henri Alhegeri's mugshot the day of the shooting.
Arriving at approximately 12:57 pm, Henri hid in the crowd and waited for Isabelle to take the stage. About halfway through her speech, he discreetly pulled out his pistol and waited for Isabelle to finish. Once she finished, Isabelle began to leave the stage. At this time Henri opened fire, hitting Isabelle in the gut and in the shoulder at 1:20 pm, sending the crowd into total disarray. Before he could make his escape, a young girl grabbed his leg and held on with what was described as a ‘vice grip’. Once he turned around, he was tackled by Vivian Cadieux-Foden and forcibly restrained until police arrived and placed him under arrest.
After she was shot, Isabelle was only staggered by the shots and initially tried to walk it off, but the pain, shortness of breath, and blood loss caused her to collapse just after the stairs. She tried to get up on her own power, but couldn’t due to radial neuropathy in her left arm and severe bleeding from the bullet wounds. Isabelle would later state that before she collapsed and fell off the stage, which broke her collarbone, she smiled as she saw Margaux grab her assailant's leg. Wanting to help, she couldn't use her left arm, which led to her collapse off the stage and clavicle fracture. Edouard immediately rushed to his wife’s aid after calling 911 to alleviate her bleeding wounds. By this point she had fallen off the stage and was beginning to fade. While doing so, Edouard heard Isabelle say ‘Don’t worry Mother, I’m coming.’ As she was fading, she recalled seeing a vision of her father and brother alongside her mother, all four of them surrounded by a white light extending a hand to her.
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Isabelle after undergoing a nine-hour operation on the same day she was shot.
Upon arrival, EMTs loaded Isabelle onto the ambulance and managed to stabilize her on the way to Hotel-Dieu, reinflating her lung on the way. The ambulance arrived at 1:30 and arrived at Hotel-Dieu at 1:40 pm. Isabelle died in the ambulance due to blood loss but was resuscitated on the way to the hospital. Margaux was holding onto her mother's hand for the entirety of the trip to the hospital. Before she went in for surgery, Isabelle gave a thumbs up before entering the operating room. She was operated on for over nine hours to alleviate the internal bleeding, remove the two bullets in her body and fix her fractured collarbone and partially severed radial nerve. She emerged from the operating room and was in a room recovering by 10:15 the same night. The surgery was successful as Isabelle winked after exiting the operating room. Isabelle spent two weeks in the hospital still with severe radial neuropathy, even after her discharge from the hospital. It was even debated that Isabelle’s left arm may be amputated. She ended up keeping her arm after doctors determined that there was a chance she could regain feeling in it. Much to her surprise, she was visited by Quin Williams during her stay, and the two caught up. She took time away from Paris and spent time with a rehabilitation specialist under an intense physiotherapy regimen for a year out at her cabin north of Aix-les-Bains, and recovered functioning and feeling in her left arm.
Aftermath[]
Isabelle posing for Heart of the Eagle Magazine in the May 9th, 1966 issue, eight months after she was shot. Note the bullet wounds on her left side.
Isabelle would later recover from her injuries after a year-long rehabilitation program out at her cabin, recovering function in her left arm and posing topless in a special editorial in Heart and Eagle Magazine on her 47th birthday to show off all the scars she had attained over the course of her life on May 9th, 1966, which included the two bullet wounds on her left side, and detailed her battle with addiction to hydrocodone due to the intense pain caused by the bullets to Isabelle. The photos would be included in a special editorial in the July issue of Playboy Magazine without her consent, which Isabelle wasn’t too fond of, which led to magazines with her in them being pulled off the shelf at her request, or else she would press charges. The magazine is a rare collector’s item in the present day, and the only known copy is within the archives of the Eagles of Europe in Paris. Isabelle would live out the rest of her life with breathing problems, passing away at the age of 93 in 2013 from a brief bout of pneumonia brought on by inflammatory breast cancer.
Henri Alhegeri escaped police custody shortly after being booked and fled to Qatar in an attempt to start life anew as a migrant worker in Doha. Vivian and Edouard led an expedition to Doha where they successfully captured him and extradited back to France, where he was formally arrested, and was later tried in a criminal court. He was determined to be sane during the trial and convicted of attempted assassination and attempted murder on October 18th, 1965 after a two-month trial and sentenced to thirty-five years in the high-security wing of La Sante Prison in Paris. He would serve thirty years before passing away from b-cell lymphoma at the age of 58 on April 22nd, 1995.
Isabelle posing for a photoshoot during her recovery, March 1966. Note the bullet wound on her lower left abdomen.
Despite playing a pivotal role in the assassination attempt, Martina Laurent denied any role in the assassination attempt on Isabelle’s life, although she stated several times that Isabelle had deserved what she had gotten. After a few months of hiding, Martina Laurent was eventually arrested in Nice and extradited back to Rome, where she was imprisoned for plotting an assassination, bribery, and attempted murder. She was sentenced to seven years in prison for the former two charges. Much to a shock, Martina was released after serving two years and one month on good behavior. Many speculate that Martina was bribed out of prison by Abstergo and the CIA. Martina would later state in an interview that the pistol and the money she gave Henri to kill Isabelle with was given to her by the CIA.
In a letter written just before her death, Martina would state that if they succeeded in killing Isabelle, they were to have delivered Isabelle's body to CIA Headquarters in Langley, Virginia, where they would dissect Isabelle's body and remove her internal organs for study, where they would be paid handsomely to dispose of Isabelle's body in an oil barrel and throw it into Lake Mead in Nevada. Martina would state that she regretted the attempt on Isabelle's life over the years. It was even speculated that Xavier Andreu, Isabelle’s ex-husband, played a role in the attempt, to which he said, ' despite the way our relationship ended, I never wanted to or had any intent on killing her.’
Isabelle's Visit to Henri[]
On April 9th, 1984, Isabelle visited La Sante Prison in Paris, wishing to speak to Henri Alhegeri. She was led to the visitors quarters and waited for them to bring Henri out to her. It wasn't long of a wait as Henri was brought out to her, clad in a orange jumpsuit and shackles. Once he sat down, Isabelle cut to the chase and asked Henri as to why he shot her and who made him do it. After trying to dodge the questions, he revealed that he was bribed by a woman with dirty blonde hair (Martina Laurent) and that he wished Isabelle was dead, to which Isabelle revealed her true identity, much to Henri's shock. Isabelle later showed Henri the wounds caused by his bullets and the fact that she nearly lost her left arm, which led to Henri openly weeping and regretting his decision to shoot her. Isabelle told him that he was merely used by Martina to kill her and now he has to live with the consequences for the rest of his life. Before she left, she informed Henri to live his life well and would visit him from time to time until his death in 1995.
Reactions[]
The reactions stemming from the incident were mixed. Many people commended Isabelle’s resilience and perseverance to get back on her feet after the attempt in which she could have died. Among the Templars, it was largely negative with many saying Henri and Martina had failed in their attempt to kill their number one target.
Some Assassins were also critical of Isabelle as well, with Elizabeth Baudin commenting on her strength and courage, she also said that Isabelle should not have exposed herself by unveiling the portraits and giving the speech a week before the event happened.
Trivia[]
- Isabelle is the only member of the Dorian Family to survive three assassination attempts.
- It was believed that Henri had schizophrenia, due to him stating in a prison interview that he was ‘driven by the voice of God’ to kill Isabelle. This was later proven correct during a mental evaluation in prison, but also later retracted after another study.
- Despite Henri being diagnosed with schizophrenia, he was never transferred to a mental hospital.
- The Colt 45 pistol used to shoot Isabelle and the two bullets removed from her are on display in the Isabelle Allard Museum in Saint-Denis, Paris, France.
- Artwork on this page is done by Timaeus (@timayonnaise on Instagram) and Melanie (@i_am_the_vigilante_ on Instagram)