Henri Paul
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- This article is about the chauffeur involved in Lady Diana's death. For the actor who played Benny in Crossroads, see Paul Henry (actor).
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Henri Paul (July 3, 1956 - August 31, 1997) was an employee of the Hôtel Ritz Paris and the chauffeur driving at the time of the automobile accident that killed him along with Diana, Princess of Wales, and her romantic interest Dodi Al-Fayed. Trevor Rees-Jones, Al-Fayed's bodyguard, survived (see details of the crash).
French police report that Paul was under the influence of alcohol and trying to elude paparazzi at high speed when the automobile he was driving crashed into a column supporting the Alma Tunnel in Paris, France. Some controversy surrounds when, how, and even whether Paul might have consumed as much alcohol as the police suggest he did.[citation needed] His blood alcohol content level was between 1.73 grams per litre to 1.75 grams per litre.
Paul received a pilot's license in 1974. His annual pilot's physical three days before the accident did not reveal alcoholism. The original document Certificat D'Aptitude Physique et Mentale was shown in German-Television "ZDF" in 1998 (Diana - Geheimnisse der Todesnacht, ZDF 1998).
His employer, the Ritz Hotel, had him trained as a driver by Mercedes-Benz.
There are several conspiracy theories surrounding Paul, most of which are bogus.
New DNA evidence proves the driver of Princess Diana's car was drunk on the night of her fatal crash in a Paris underpass in 1997, the British Broadcasting Corp. reported Saturday.
The tests confirm that original post-mortem blood samples were from driver Henri Paul and that he had three times the French legal limit of alcohol in his blood, the BBC said, quoting from a documentary it will screen Sunday.[1]
