Biography
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Years Active
1981 – 1988 (7 years)
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Members
- Benoît Destriau (1981 – 1988)
- Bruno Cornet (1984 – 1988)
- Gilles Bertin (1981 – 1986)
- Éric Ferrer (1983 – 1988)
Camera Silens was a French punk band from Bordeaux active between 1981 and 1988.
Gilles Bertin (25 March 1961 – 7 November 2019) was a French bassist and singer, and a member of the punk band Camera Silens from 1981 to 1986. Gilles Bertin took part in a bank robbery in Toulouse on 27 April 1988, where nearly 12 million francs were stolen. Gilles Bertin went on the run for 28 years before handing himself in to police.
Camera Silens was a French punk rock/Oi! (with also some reggae and rhythm & blues influences) from Bordeaux formed in 1981, stopped in 1988.
Line up:
1981-1982 : Gilles Bertin (bass, vocals) – Benoît Destriau (guitar) – Philippe Schneiberger (drums)
1983 : Benoît Destriau (guitar, vocals) – Eric Ferrer (bass) – Nicolas Mouriesse (drums)
1984-1985 : Benoît Destriau (guitar) – Gilles Bertin (vocals) – Eric Ferrer (bass) – Bruno Cornet (drums)
1986-1988 : Benoît Destriau (guitar, vocals) – Eric Ferrer (bass) – Bruno Cornet (drums) – François Borne (saxophone)
Born in Paris on 25 March 1961, Gilles Bertin moved to Bordeaux with his parents as a teenager. In Bordeaux, he founded the punk band Camera Silens as a bassist and a singer. The band enjoyed significant success in the French punk rock scene. After he became a drug addict and tested seropositive, he fell into delinquency.
On 27 April 1988, Bertin participated in a robbery on the Toulouse department of Brink's along with a dozen other robbers, after two years of preparation. The group stole 11,571,316 francs, despite never firing a shot. To this day, most of the loot has never been found. After police launched "Operation Sangria", all participants of the robbery were arrested within two years, except for Bertin. He fled to Spain, and then later, Portugal while running a record shop dedicated to alternative rock. In 1995, Bertin fell ill with AIDS, but survived thanks to tritherapy. In 2000, he returned to Barcelona and worked in a bar owned by his family while living under several identities.
On 26 November 2016, Bertin returned to France to face justice. His trial began on 6 June 2018, and he faced 20 years imprisonment. However, Bertin was only sentenced to five years with suspension, after the prosecution cited "good conduct."
In February 2019, Bertin published an autiobiography, titled Trente ans de cavale, ma vie de punk with the publisher Éditions Robert Laffont.
On 7 November 2019, Gilles Bertin succumbed to AIDS after spending several weeks in a coma. He was 58.
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