LONDON - A British convicted conman whose neighbours grew suspicious about his activities after watching a Netflix documentary on his swindling past is to stand trial for knocking over two French police officers as he tried to escape from them.
Robert Hendy-Freegard, also known as David Hendy, is the central figure in the documentary "The Puppet Master: Hunting the Ultimate Conman" and the fictional film "Rogue Agent", both available on Netflix.
In 2005, a London court had sentenced Hendy-Freegard to life in prison for kidnapping, deception and stealing from students and women -- from whom he took more than a million pounds -- while posing as a spy for MI5, Britain's domestic intelligence service.
But he was freed in 2009 after an appeals court overturned his conviction for kidnapping, with outraged victims warning he would strike again.
Hendy-Freegard had been illegally breeding dogs and living on-and-off in the village of Vidaillat in the sparsely populated Creuse region of central France for seven years when police visited in August 2022 to check on the conditions at the kennels.
He turned up in his car "to ask the police officers what they were doing", a neighbour who witnessed the events told AFP on condition of anonymity.
"They checked his papers but he still had the keys in the ignition. He turned on the engine and fled, hitting the two cops," the neighbour said.
A policewoman and a policeman were signed off work for 21 and six days respectively after suffering injuries in the car ramming.
Hendy-Freegard managed to escape as far as Belgium but was arrested the following month and then extradited back to France, where he has been in custody since October 2022.
He could be jailed for up to 10 years if found guilty of the violence that incapacitated the public officials.
Hendy-Freegard never explained why he rammed into the police officers.
During the investigation in 2023, his then attorney Juliette Magne-Gandois said he had "always denied any intent to kill anyone".