International Criminal Police Organization

The International Criminal Police Organization provides the first international reach for Claude Lebel’s investigation into an unnamed political assassin. From its communications room, Lebel and Lucien Caron contact senior homicide officials in seven countries, asking them to search their knowledge and files for a professional killer whose identity and location remain unknown. The organization’s role is practical rather than commanding: secure communications and established police contacts let a still-fragile inquiry cross national boundaries without yet becoming a formal request between police forces.

International Reach and Police Contacts

Lebel draws on relationships formed through earlier meetings of the International Criminal Police Organization. He asks for direct contact with the head of each country’s homicide division, or, if that official cannot be reached, the deputy chief. The proposed contacts are in the United States, Britain, Belgium, Holland, Italy, West Germany, and South Africa. This list makes the inquiry international from its opening stage, while keeping its focus on the specialist police officials most likely to recognize a political assassin.

The calls are arranged through the organization’s communications service for the morning, with a schedule prepared in advance. Lebel wants each conversation to be person-to-person over UHF, without anyone listening in, and stresses that the information is for the recipient’s ears alone. The requested secrecy reflects the investigation’s uncertainty as well as its urgency: the authorities are responding to a tip, not to a confirmed attempt or a fully developed official case between countries.

The Communications Room

At ten minutes to seven, a police car brings Lebel and Caron to the organization’s headquarters on Rue Paul Valery. The building has an inconspicuous green door; its communications room is in the basement. For the next three hours, the two detectives work over the telephone, using high-frequency signals sent from the aerials on the roof and relayed over long distances. The narrative emphasizes the technical separation between the callers: the wavelengths and scramblers are described as impossible to intercept, allowing police officials to speak across borders without an open, readily overheard exchange.

Caron supports the calls as interpreter. Dietrich, the official in Bonn, speaks French, so Lebel can speak to him directly; Caron interprets for the other five officials. The communications service thus supplies more than a connection: the sequence depends on arranging access to the right officials, protecting the calls, and bridging language differences while Lebel delivers the same carefully limited account to each one.

An Unnamed Killer as the Search Criterion

Lebel does not initially present the matter as an official enquiry between two police forces. He says that the authorities do not yet know whether an offence has been intended or whether preparations have begun, and characterizes the approach as a routine tip-off. He can offer little identifying information: no name and only a poor physical description. The request is therefore built around a professional profile rather than a known suspect.

The decisive criterion is that the man must be a leading political assassin with several successful killings behind him, not merely a gangland gunman. Lebel reasons that someone at this level would have accumulated a record and attracted attention somewhere, even if he had never operated in the country whose files were being consulted. The pauses and quieter, more concerned responses that follow his explanation convey how the police chiefs understand its implication: there is only one target in France likely to interest such a killer. The organization’s network turns that inference into a question that can be put to investigators abroad.

A Network Within a Wider Manhunt

The international calls do not identify the assassin on the spot, nor do they amount to a centrally directed operation by the International Criminal Police Organization. They create a confidential channel through which national homicide officials can consider whether a political killer fits their experience or records. Lebel’s method depends on both sides of that arrangement: his personal familiarity with police colleagues makes the contacts possible, while the communications infrastructure makes those contacts usable under pressure.

The inquiry’s broader course also shows the limits of any single information channel. The authorities continue to work through records and local searches: a later check of French archives uncovers border reports and a hotel registration under Alexander James Quentin Duggan, while Lebel separately orders a ground search around the car found near Ussel. These efforts are not presented as work performed by the International Criminal Police Organization. They clarify instead how its contribution fits into the manhunt: it opens an international line of enquiry while identification and pursuit still depend on records, local police action, and Lebel’s continuing deductions.