The Tragic End of Marco Muller: From Footballer to Fugitive

Marco Muller, the tragic end of a former footballer: he died at 71, the man committed suicide by throwing himself under a train. The former Swiss player had been on the run for 36 years. A life spent in hiding to escape his criminal past, made up of bank robberies without ever firing a shot: it was this detail of his 'second career' that had him nicknamed the 'Swiss Robin Hood', in addition to the fact that he stole from places where there was a lot of money. Marco Muller's suicide, his story Muller was a midfielder with appearances in the Swiss youth national teams, in the '70s he played among others with Young Boys in the top Swiss league, then he took a wrong turn, becoming a bandit who at the time ended up on the front page. The former footballer died - after going into hiding for almost 40 years - right near his hometown, Bassecourt, in the Canton of Jura. His body was found in February on the railway tracks and was only identified in recent days through a comparative DNA analysis conducted with a relative. In the '80s - after hanging up his boots - Muller carried out several robberies on banks and armored vans. His life, worthy of a movie, saw him escape from prison twice. The first from the prison of the cantonal capital of Jura, where he was detained for robberies in Jura and Neuchatel. On that occasion, after escaping, he sent a case of cognac to the Jura cantonal police for Christmas as a mockery. The second and final escape was from the Thorberg prison, in the canton of Bern, where he was imprisoned to be tried for two robberies of valuables in Geneva and Delemont. THE MILLIONS It was 1988, from that moment Marco Muller completely disappeared, became a ghost and his story almost a forgotten legend. The story of the footballer who managed to steal a total loot estimated at almost three million francs (just over three million euros, not found even in part), before disappearing with a move worthy of the champion he had never been with cleats. Until reappearing lifeless on the tracks, a paradox for someone who had never wanted to follow the tracks of life. It was thought that the fugitive footballer had hidden in France in the years following the last escape, then he decided to end his life where everything had started 71 years ago, the city where he was born. A former accomplice of Muller, Andre Jaggi, stated: 'I don't believe Marco ever returned to his hometown while he was on the run. He wasn't stupid. Even under a false identity, they would have recognized him here by his way of walking. He usually kept most of the money after the robberies. Then he would ask me to lend him some of my share and said he would pay me back at the next robbery.' Yves Girard, a contemporary of Muller, worked in a bank in Bassecourt that was robbed by the former footballer in 1979. His memory of that day is vivid: 'That guy came in with a red wig and a long coat, like in a Sergio Leone movie. He pulled out sticks of dynamite and told me to take all the money from the safe or I would be blown up.' Probably Marco would never have done it. That he was a bandit cannot be denied, but there must have been a reason why they called him Robin Hood...