Shooting suspect linked to 1994 French murder

France said on Thursday the suspect arrested over this week's shootings in Paris is a man previously jailed for his role in a "Bonnie-and-Clyde"- style multiple murder that gripped the country 20 years ago.

Abdelhakim Dekhar was arrested on Wednesday after a major manhunt following a shooting at the left-wing newspaper Liberation that left an assistant photographer seriously hurt and another shooting at the headquarters of the Societe Generale bank.

His DNA matched samples from the scenes of the attacks, officials said.

"All the evidence today points to his involvement in the events that he has been charged with," said Interior Minister Manuel Valls.

Dekhar, who is in his late 40s, was convicted in 1998 of buying a gun used in an October 1994 shooting attack by student Florence Rey and her lover, Audry Maupin. Three policemen, a taxi driver and Maupin himself were killed in a case that shook France.

He served four years in jail for his role in the killings, and his former lawyers have described him as "enigmatic" and "strange".

Dekhar was arrested on Wednesday evening in a vehicle in an underground parking lot in the northwestern Paris suburb of Bois-Colombes, after apparently trying to commit suicide.

Valls said that "everything appears to point to a suicide attempt". Sources said Dekhar was semi-conscious when he was found.

The arrest came after a massive manhunt following the shootings.

In the attack on the Societe Generale bank, Dekhar fired into the bank's lobby. The gunman then forced a driver to take him to the Champs-Elysees boulevard after which he melted into the crowd.

Police were able to identify Dekhar using DNA traces left behind on spent cartridges and in the car he used to get to the central Paris boulevard.

The head of the Paris criminal police department, Christian Flaesch, said Dekhar was in custody in a "medical environment" and was not in a fit state to speak to investigators.

Valls said investigators would need more information to be able to "understand his motivation", adding that "one or two letters" had been found.

AFP-Reuters