THE PHILADELPHIA DAILY NEWS	Local Wednesday, June 18, 1997

Here in this Old World country village in the south of France, where Einhorn has lived on the lam since 1992, he had regained some of the guru status he once held in Philadelphia.

His fringe followers officially belong to a French organization opposed to burying nuclear waste in the local town, La Chapelle-Baton. Unofficially, some of his proteges are known to the French as the Baba Cool -- Cool Daddies.

To these young French hippies, Einhorn, once Philadelphia's counterculture leader, is the grey haired, bearded master. He is the Vieux Baba Cool -- Old Cool Daddy.

Einhorn's closest neighbor, a grimy, long-haired Baba Cool who would not give his name, is one of the loyal disciples. This skinny, edgy member of the local anti-nuclear organization said he is outraged by the media coverage of Einhorn's Friday arrest.
He knows Einhorn as Eugene Mallon, a rotund chap who said he was an English writer with passions for saving the environment and battling big business. This friend does not know Einhorn as the Philadelphia poet-prophet who savagely beat his girlfriend to death, then left her body rotting in a steamer trunk in the closet.

All he knows, he said, is that Vieux Baba Cool and his Swedish wife, Anika Flodin, have alaways been kind to him.

``He did not chop my head off,'' the Baba Cool yelled from the doorway of his home.

But Einhorn did fill this man's head with a lust for activism.

Even as Einhorn sits in the Maison D'arret Gradignan, a jail outside Bordeaux, his ardent follower continues espousing Einhorn's philosophy by handing a reporter a copy of a Greenpeace newsletter.

On the back of the eight-page color pamphlet, just above the addresses and telephone numbers of the organization's national offices, the local branch of ``R. Nucleaire'' bears Einhorn's home address.

It appears that Einhorn, known here as somewhat of a recluse, could not keep his activism at bay after learning of the threat of nuclear dumping.

``He was never a problem,'' the Baba Cool said. ``I don't want to say anything against him.''

Just around the bend in the road from the young hippie's home is the lovely stone building where Einhorn and Flodin lived -- a former windmill updated with formidable TV antennae, three stone chimneys and low barbed-wire fences.

Yesterday, Einhorn's red Fiat, with the French version of No Nuke bumper stickers, was parked under a carport. The red iron cowbell hanging from the fence went unanswered.

An unidentified man who acted as a guard shooed a reporter away. The woman who was known to the community as Madame Mallon was not giving interviews, the man said.

While she was not taken into custody last week, Anika Flodin may be in legal jeopardy, according to French authorities.

Knowledgable sources said French police want to bring charges against the woman for harboring a fugitive. But so far the prosecutor in Angouleme, the county seat, has refused to do so, claiming he needs more evidence.

Einhorn lived between The Gold and The Silver, two creeks that surround his home, Moulin de Guitry. Vines and blooming trees, common in this wine region, claw toward the home's orange tile roof.

On every windowsill, step and stone pillar around the house, impatiens, geraniums, marigolds and green plants sprout from clay planters and metal tubs. Stronger, taller foliage -- towering trees and waist-high weeds -- shield the inner courtyard of the home from uninvited guests.

It took a reporter 20 minutes of hiking through the marshy, bug-infested growth, and over the barbed wire on Einhorn's property, to glimpse beyond the shuttered doors seen from the street.

It is from this hidden vantage that Einhorn's inner sanctum could be viewed -- the white fence, beautiful roses and canopy of trees surrounding a second-floor porch and its large, white picnic umbrella.

It was here that French undercover police, queried by Interpol, posed as fishermen and tourists to pierce Einhorn's secret life. After sneaking around for several weeks and snapping photos, the undercover French cops sent their pictures to the FBI for comparison with old photos of Einhorn and Flodin.

After the FBI was satisfied that Mallon and Einhorn were the same person, Interpol sought an arrest warrant on Thursday. Einhorn was arrested just after dawn the following day.
The Philadelphia district attorney's office expects to complete paperwork seeking Einhorn's extradition ``sometime in the next two weeks,'' said spokesman Bill Davol.

The documents, he said, must go through the FBI and State Department, then to the U.S. Embassy in Paris before they can be filed with French courts.

As to whether charges are contemplated against any Americans who aided Einhorn's escape, Davol said, ``we would evaluate any evidence that came to our attention as to others involved, but are not anticipating that to happen.''

Just up the road from the windmill, Madame and Monsieur Mallon could partake of life in a village that seems untouched by time.

They could shop for fresh fruit or crusty baguettes in the town's only grocery store, or enjoy a local wine at the nearby cafe.

But Einhorn was an infrequent participant, the locals said. His neighbors rarely saw him. It's likely they never will again.
Hubert Barat of the French newspaper Sud-Ouest contributed to this report.

Philadelphia Online -- Philadelphia Daily News -- Local News Copyright Wednesday, June 18, 1997