By Europe Correspondent Melissa Davies
The brother of a man gunned down in the French Alps has turned up at a police station in Britain to deny they had been arguing. Four people were shot dead on an isolated road in the Alps, and two young girls survived.
Police are investigating claims the brothers were in a dispute over their father's inheritance.
Friends of Saad al-Hilli say he confided in them about something which was worrying him before he took his family away on holiday.
But just what that was and whether it's relevant to the gruesome killings has French police baffled.
“We've had some information from a UK police source that there was a dispute between two brothers,” says public prosecutor Eric Millaud.
“[It was] a dispute between the two brothers about money. His brother came forward to the police voluntarily. He then represented himself today to talk about a dispute between he and his brother to say ‘hang on a minute, I did not have any dispute with my brother’.”
Police say they are still pursuing claims that the al-Hilli brothers were feuding over their late father's property portfolio, but in the meantime they're hopeful the crime scene will provide more clues.
The al-Hilli's car was found backed up into a bank in remote woodland, the driver's window shattered.
There's a gunshot hole in the front passenger window and a completely smashed rear window where Iqbal al-Hilli and her mother were shot dead while four-year-old Zeena huddled on the floor.
“The evidence of the four-year-old girl did not reveal anything in particular other than fear, terror, anger and fury,” says Mr Millaud. “Since the beginning of this carnage she was already between her mother and this other woman, and she rushed under the legs of her mother. She doesn't reveal anything to the inquiry.”
With hope fading of a first-hand witness account, police are investigating sightings of a man driving a white 4x4 erratically soon after the attacks.
The inquiry, running in both France and Britain, is one of Europe’s most extensive murder investigations.
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