Charles Sobhraj was pictured being taken to an immigration office in Kathmandu ahead of his deportation (Picture: AFP)
A notorious French serial killer dubbed ‘The Serpent’ has been freed from jail.
Charles Sobhraj targeted backpackers travelling around Asia throughout the 1970s and 80s.
He would use disguises to lure Western tourists to him and is suspected of killing more than 20 people on the so-called ‘hippie trail’.
Now 78-years-old, he has spent nearly 20 years behinds bars in Nepal and will soon be sent back to Europe.
Sobhraj had his sentence cut short by a few months on account of his age.
The news was welcomed by the mother of the woman he married while behind bars in 2008, despite a 44-year age gap.
Sakuntala Thapa said: ‘I’m happy and have great respect for our judiciary and Supreme court.’
He has been held in a high-security prison since 2003, when he was convicted of murdering American backpacker Connie Jo Bronzich in 1975.
The notorious killer was removed from the prison in a van and will soon be back in France (Picture: EPA)
He was taken to an airport and boarded a flight back to his native France (Picture: AFP)
Nihita Biswas, the Nepalese wife of Charles Sobraj, was seen outside court (Picture: EPA)
Sobhraj denied killing her but was later also found guilty of killing Bronzich’s Canadian friend, Laurent Carriere.
Police in Thailand have linked him to six more deaths, accusing him of drugging his victims before killing them and dumping their bodies on the beach.
His true number of victims is not known but some investigators believe it could be dozens.
He was jailed in India for poisoning a group of French tourists in the capital, New Delhi, in 1976, before he could stand trial on the charges against him in Thailand.
Sobhraj escaped from India’s Tihar jail in 1986 after drugging prison guards with cookies and cakes laced with sleeping pills.
He has inspired various dramatisations over the years and has been described by those who knew him as a con artist, a seducer, a robber and a murderer.
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Charles Sobhraj preyed on backpackers travelling in Asia in the 1970s and 80s.
